


This Could Be My Favorite Yesterday

by Merkey666



Series: High School Au [8]
Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, Mindless Self Indulgence, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, The Used, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: A fun time had by all, Alcohol, Alternate Universe - High School, Bandom - Freeform, Camping, Cheesy, Drug Use, Drunken Shenanigans, Everything is so very gay, Fluff, Gay, Lakes, Multi, Romance, Sappy, Skype, Summer, group chats, seriously so many drugs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2019-05-28
Packaged: 2019-07-03 16:18:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 54,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15822504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merkey666/pseuds/Merkey666
Summary: The Gang(tm) takes a last minute camping trip before their final year of high school together, and things go about as well as you'd expect.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Someone stop letting me start new series' without finishing my preexisting ones
> 
> Anyway, if you liked this please let me know! Enjoy!

To give you a frame of reference, Spencer sent out the message on Thursday afternoon. It was around the time that his friends would be released from their unrelenting and meaningless summer jobs. Probably thinking they’d go home, shower, and waste the rest of the day, waiting for summer to drain away from them, his friends were not in the best of moods. His timing was precise and intentional. Having waited until his friends were in desperate need of a pick me up, Spencer swooped in with an easy fix. 

Spenis: hey guys! i know you’re all busy with summer jobs and shit, and since summer is in fact coming to a close, I wanted to give you guys the option to actually enjoy some of it. my family usually has a summer reunion every year, but due to overlapping travel schedules, we can’t do it. essentially, we have three campsites booked in the mountains, and since my parents are in the Bahamas rn, i’ve got no reason not to invite the fuck out of you all. ‘Course, we’d have to bring all of our own shit (i.e. food and gear) and there’s no cell service, but there’s a lake and it’s hella nice ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Pricky: you had me @ lake

Stoner McBoner: If Brendon goes, I will too

Spenis: what, cuz i’m not just your best friend or anything?

Stoner McBoner: ya but he sucks my dick so :/

Spenis: thanks for sharing! never speak to me again

Purest Word of God: okay,,, but what’s the catch 

Memelord1.0: how do u know there is 1

Purest Word of God: theres always a catch

Hayl Satan: besides, why would he really be trying to make our lives better

Memelord1.0: that’s a damn good point

Fronk: first of all, agree, but secondly, I think he told the catches to us already lol. no service, cooking, etc.

Purest Word of God: nah, that’s not it

Spenis: idk what you’re talking about. i mean. the only other foreseeable issue is that we leave saturday morning

Fronk: SATURDAY?

Memelord1.0: wTF MAN THAT’S LIKE 0 TIME

Pricky: idk it’s not like i’ve got anything better to do than pack

Spenis: lame :/

Pricky: do you want me to come or not, bitch

Hayl Satan: guys calm down. a) i’ll send a generic packing list

Hayl Satan: b) we’ll figure out who’s buying food, what we’re eating, etc

Hayl Satan: c) we carpool, figure out sleeping arrangements AHEAD of time, etc x2

Hayl Satan: d) my mom has a sports basement club card, so

Spenis: hayley i will marry you

Hayl Satan: what makes you think i want your musty ass

The b00b: Hayley i will marry you

Hayl Satan: only if i get to wear white

Sunshine: idk what i’m more excited for, their wedding or a break from work

Stoner McBoner: ya, I hate to give you validation, but this is really what i needed

Purest Word of God: tbh, i’m ready to just relax and have a good time

Pricky: okay guys I’ve got store credit at the liquor store by my house, are we feeling vodka or tequila

Eggan: tequila makes me take my panties off

Get Hard: last time I drank vodka i ended up in Salt Lake. that’s an hour from my house

Pricky: both it is!

Stoner McBoner: am i the only one concerned with his “store credit”? how tf

Stoner McBoner: on second thought, that’s not a question i want answered

Pricky: are you implying i whore myself out for liquor because you’re absolutely right

Eggan: BRENDON

Spenis: SHUT UP OH MY GOD

Purest Word of God: THIS IS A FAMILY FRIENDLY GROUP CHAT

Burgerface: MY E Y ES 

Old Man Jonnie: OKAY first someone kick brendon and second i’m TRYING to help you clueless fucks organize carpools so can i have a raise of hands of every that’s going?

Spencer bit his nails while people responded, but to his surprise, everyone replies as “YES”. Lindsey just had to go overboard. 

The b00b: assuming all of us go, approximately how many more people can we fit? Just out of curiosity,,

Spenis: comfortably? we’re at max

The b00b: …uncomfortably?

Spenis: how many people did you invite?

The b00b: ;)

Spenis: Lindsey

The b00b: ;)))

Spenis: LINDSEY

Purest Word of God: Let it be an adventure, babe

Pricky: babe

Get Hard: babe

Memelord1.0: babe

The b00b: babe

Eggan: babe

The Purest Word of God: OKAY i get it shut up

Spenis: sometimes there are open campsites that don’t need to be reserved, your buddies can just use those, you kniving scoundrel

Old Man Jonnie: omg we’re spreading like a plague

The b00b: we better be. Bcuz this week is gonna be SICK

Spenis: you’re a disgrace

One punster to another, Spencer advised Lindsey to be wise in who she invited because as much as he enjoyed a good time, he didn’t need his parents asking how he’d gotten his entire friend group banned from public property. Not again. All apprehensions aside, he really was ready to have the time of his life with his friends, no matter who ended up without panties on, or in the lake. Just him, his friends, and nature, in a mad race to see which kills which first. Ah, humans are a wonderful breed. 

Spenis: glad you’re all excited. make sure you go over the Smith Family Approved Packing List i’ll be emailing you all. it might seem lame but when you’re in the middle of fucking nowhere without socks, it fucking sucks. 

The Star: you’re really making me feel good about this trip, spence

Spenis: don’t worry, at the bare minimum, it’s not like the trip is going to be boring :)

Pricky: i’m gonna put my dick in a tree

Spenis: exhibit A

Spencer decided to go pack, as that was definitely enough internet for one day.


	2. Trees n Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dallon doesn't know what a beet is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that only took ninety years to write
> 
> if you like this plz leave a comment it's literally my only motivation to keep writing
> 
> thx for reading :)

Since Spencer was the perpetrator of this whole “Lord of the Flies” type experiment, he really kicked his party planner inclination into overdrive. Not only that, but also his mom friend instincts were on the fritz. He had doubted he had that sort of kindness in him until he watched his friends try to name the supplies they would need to bring with them, and the group collectively got stuck after “tent”. 

Luckily, Hayley, the One Woman Machine, helped everyone pool their resources and divvy out exactly who still needed what. And with the aforementioned Sports Basement Club Card, it wasn’t too much of a task. The only thing still remaining on the checklist was food, and since the gang had spent all of Friday evening packing and making sure they were borderline over-packed for the trip, Spencer had had no time to purchase dinner makings. The nearest Safeway opened at eleven AM, but if he went shopping and then convened for the rendezvous, traffic would be ungodly. The best he could do was get on the road early and make a stop along the way. 

Feeling like a worry-wart as he drove toward Lindsey’s house, Spencer reminded himself that this was the best he could do, and that no one else could do any better than that. He’d given up on self-deprecation a long time ago, when he’d watched Ryan swing two rolls of sausage like nunchucks and hit his advisor in the face on the first day of high school. It was a fun memory. 

Rolling up to the rendezvous point in his parent’s dirt garnished minivan, Spencer only barely had time to pull the parking brake before his friends greeted him with excited hoots and hollers. They tried to get in the moment they got within reach, but since Spencer had forgotten to unlock the doors, the closest few went right on in through the windows. Truly the one and only, Brendon tried the sunroof. 

Spencer hopped out, not wasting a single moment, and began to load the car with his friend’s duffle bags. As he packed bag after bag, some worryingly light, others unsettlingly heavy, he only prayed that, at the bare minimum, his friend’s could pack an overnight bag. Hayley appeared next to him, struggling with the weight of every single tent on her shoulders. 

“Here, lemme help you with that,” Spencer laughed quietly, taking the tent bags off of her gently, while she stood there, T-posing.

“So, in your car you’ve got all of the stuff bags, and the tents, right? So, that leaves the other two cars with A) all the food, and B) sleeping bags, sleeping pads, screen tents, kitchen stuff, et cetera, et cetera. Okay, got it,” Hayley mumbled while Spencer crammed the tent bags into the trunk. 

“How much space does that leave us with? Lindsey is gonna bring some people up mid week and I don’t think they’re bringing their own car.” Spencer slammed the trunk before anything could fall out of it. Miraculously, it stayed shut. He patted it lovingly.

“Fuck, man. Not a lot. I mean…” she turned around and observed the vans being swarmed like a beehive. “Factually speaking, we have enough space to actually lose a car, but all the stuff is the problem. if we could fit it all in the trunk, then we’d have no problem but… It doesn’t work like that.”

Spencer nodded. “Well, it’s whatever. If they don’t fit, we can just leave them. It’s on her.”

“We could always eat them.”

“Good point.” 

In not another ten minutes, the cars were locked and loaded and the party was crammed like sardines within them. Spencer’s caravan led the brigade, heading toward the highway, with his entourage tailgating behind him. Skipping early morning Safeway did eliminate a lot of the traffic, but some was unavoidable. After cruising for about half an hour, they got stuck in the first—and likely not the last—traffic jam. But the slow-going was perfectly enjoyable because Brendon kept playing banger after banger from the speakers, and every once and a while Jon would holler with laughter, and pass his phone around, so everyone could see the meme. 

It seemed that the temperature outside was directly linked to their distance from Salt Lake City, as the farther they drove, the hotter it got. Ryan insisted on having the windows down and sticking his luxurious bowl cut into the wind. Dallon squeezed in between the front seats to get the AC straight from the source (and to get a kiss on the cheek from his boyfriend). But probably most for the AC, because by the time that gas was running low, the outside world was sweltering in the mid nineties. 

Spencer’s phone rang as he pulled off the highway and onto a smaller road into town. Brendon answered it for him. 

“Is this the nondescript, likely hillbilly town we’re stopping in to buy food?” asked Lindsey over the phone. Also from her car came the sounds of chaos, similar to what Spencer thought hell probably sounded like. Part of it was Pete and Frank arguing, another part of it was Hayley throwing up out the passenger side window, and part of it was Ray trying his honest to God best to find a radio station that wasn’t playing country.

“Indeed it is,” Spencer replied, pulling into the parking lot. Given that they were only three hours outside the city, this town really wasn’t all that bad. Hell, it even had a Starbucks, Spencer had noticed on the drive in. Now, if there was a Panda Express, that’d get him to two-thirds of small, desolate town bingo. 

“Are you really sure that sixteen liberals are really a good match for this place?” she asked, only half kidding. 

“Don’t be too quick to judge. Besides, I think Brendon’s too car sick to start any fights, and above all else, I’d really like to eat on this trip. Sound good?” Spencer retaliated, turning off the car. Lindsey agreed eventually and hung up as the second car pulled into the parking lot. 

Spencer waited to get out of the car until all three of the caravans had arrived, because no way was he about to waste any cool air. Really, he shouldn’t have been complaining, but after they’d all sat there for ten minutes and the last car hadn’t shown, he got nervous. He called Lindsey back. 

Only this time, Hayley picked up. It was her number, after all. “Hey,” she said, through what sounded like a mouth full of jello. God, he hoped it was jello. 

“Any ETA from the Edge Mobile? I don’t trust Tyler behind the wheel on an average day, let alone on a trek up to the mountains.” Spencer heard Hayley click the home button, and assumed she was checking her messages. 

“Old Man Joseph has informed us that he intended to take the scenic route about an hour ago, which I’ll take to mean he didn’t see us turn off.”

Spencer shut his eyes and let his head hit the head rest. “Why are all my friends dumbasses?” he wondered, mostly to himself, but also partially to Tyler’s astral projection that he assumed was lurking. 

“How about this—“ Hayley spoke up. “I’ll wait in the car for them to show up, while the rest of you go buy food and snacks. When they show up I’ll let them know where you are, and everything will be swell. Capiche?”

“That’s just an excuse to stay in the car!” Spencer accused. “Anyway, what do you want from the store?”

“Luna bars and a Caramel Frappe from Starbies. Don’t pretend you didn’t see it on the way in,” Hayley laughed. “Oh, and Advil. Lots. Lots of Advil.” 

Spencer could hear the car sickness in her voice. “Got it. Advil, Luna bars, Caramel Frappe.” He could practically taste it from there. Caffeine sounded like a godsend to him. Having energy? Didn’t know her. 

On that note, he hung up and unbuckled. He grabbed the door handle and almost opened it before he remembered how hot it was out there. 

“Okay, team,” Spencer whistled, turning around to face the entire car. “It’s hot as balls out there and I don’t want to be in it for any longer than I absolutely have to be, so let’s make a game plan. I say we get out and make a break for the store, not stopping until we’re within it’s icy insides. Sound good?”

“Can we Naruto run?” Brendon inquired. 

“The Naruto run is mandatory,” Spencer confirmed. “All right team. On the count of three.” Spencer readied himself with a hand on the handle. “One… two… three!” 

Five people burst from the minivan like firecrackers exploding, making good time across the parking lot. Jon almost got hit by a car, but all was well when they reconvened in the vegetable aisle. 

“You okay, buddy?” Ryan asked, wiping sweat from his brow. 

“That was pure adrenaline, baby. Ain’t nothing like it.” 

From behind the boys, the automatic doors opened before a group of dazed looking people meandering into the air conditioned store. A collective groan issued from the group, definitely earning the strange and uncomfortable looks given to them by the storegoers. Gerard, wearing all black and definitely not doing shit about it, collapsed into the shopping baskets. He sat there for a while. 

In reality, it wasn’t all that hot outside, or at least not unmanageably so. Sometimes people just needed to complain. 

“Why didn’t you run?” Spencer asked curiously.

“After watching Jon get hit by a car, none of us were all that thrilled to relive his experience,” Meagan replied, removing Gerard from the baskets and taking one for herself. 

“Almost got hit by a car. I got by scratch free!” Jon pointed out. 

“Yeah, but I think you put the driver into cardiac arrest,” Meagan laughed. 

Jon shrugged. 

“Okay! Well, now that I have all of you here and you’re too exhausted to move, listen up!” Spencer hollered, garnering their attention by force. “Hayley and I came up with a carefully coordinated dinner plan for the week, so do not buy dinner foods, I repeat— do not buy dinner foods. I’m also gonna buy a fuck ton of sandwich stuff, and of course there will be vegetarian or vegan or fructose intolerant or whatever options.”

“It’s lactose, actually—“

“Quiet, runt. All you guys and gals and assorted pals need to buy are breakfast materials for yourself, and midday-slash-trail snacks. Any questions?” Spencer regretted asking the moment Brendon raised his hand. 

“Does liquor count as a snack?” he asked. 

“Brendon, I sincerely wish all three of your remaining brain cells the best of luck in life.” 

“A hard no, then.” 

Spencer rolled his eyes. “Everyone got it? Good! Move out, troops.”

His friends didn’t exactly rush around like in Chopped, but Spencer’s expectations were pretty high to begin with. He himself bustled off, snatching up a basket and unfurling the list that he and Hayley had prepped ahead of time. Nearly everything he needed was on the list, aside from a few things, which he made up for by stopping at the Walgreens next door. But after the agony of having to walk from one store to the next in the heat, he took his time trying to find what he was looking for. The AC was too good to pass up. 

Unfortunately, he ran out of things to covet, so he paid for his items and bolted back to the supermarket. He kept a firm hand on his receipt (in case anyone decided to give him trouble) and roamed the store, searching fo this friends. He didn’t find anyone until he inspected the check out line, only to find Hayley and Tyler and Josh, as well as the rest of their caravan. He walked happily over, tried to join the conversation and quickly realized that it was less of a conversation, and more of a one-sided lecture. 

Spencer decided to intervene, which admittedly may have been a poor choice on his behalf. 

“Hey, boys! Where were you?” he asked, leaning an arm on Josh’s shoulder. 

“Vegas.”

“You—“ Spencer stopped. “You what?”

“Yeah, man. Vegas.”

“Fuck— fucking how?”

Tyler shrugged. “Just happens sometimes.” 

Hayley sent Spencer an agitated look and returned to the groceries, sipping silently on the caramel Frappe she’d gotten for herself. Nobody tried to force the conversation to go on, so the rest of the wait was spent in awkward silence. 

Tyler and Josh didn’t feel like running across the parking lot because, Spencer assumed, they were some sort of heathens or something, so the four of them half-jogged back toward the cars. It was such a weird movement, trying to speed walk with two full bags go groceries, that it only made Spencer feel worse, and whole entire purpose of not walking was defeated. He hoped that after he’d put the groceries in the trunk he’d find solace in the car.

But the car was no better. It had been sitting in the sun for forty-five minutes, and the handle nearly burned his hand, let alone the leather seats. He didn’t dare touch the seat belt. Something about how he had the keys to the car, which in turn controlled the AC, hadn’t computed. 

“How high do you want me to crank it?” Brendon asked, regarding the AC. 

“All the way. This is the last time you’ll be feeling the sweet release of air conditioning for a week. We’re in the final stretch now, boys,” Spencer replied ominously. 

Brendon did as he was told, and turned the AC to full blast. He also did everyone a favor and placed a call to Hayley’s car, just to make sure everyone was on the same page. She confirmed both her car and the Edge Mobile, also known as Tyler’s and Josh’s personal caravan, were going to follow Spencer diligently. Hayley explained she’d had a little trouble prying Lindsey from her verbal assault on a redneck who’d catcalled her, but even she’d been coerced back into the van. Over the phone, Spencer informed them that the road would get a little funky, and just to stay alert. Nobody knew what that meant. 

Not much farther out, the service began to get spotty, and panic increased by nine-hundred percent in each and every van. As the cars prepared for the final ascent up the mountain, the grade was so steep that the cars had to turn off the air conditioning and turn on the heat, just to keep the engine from overheating. This did not make for any happy campers. 

Spencer hadn’t expected it to either. But he knew that there could be no satisfaction, no pride, no euphoria unless there was a little anguish in the beginning. He’d learned to embrace it— or, maybe he was still getting there. Either way, it was especially worth it for him when the car reached the peak of the mountain, and dipped back down onto the final country road. 

Like most alpine lakes, Spencer’s lake sat in a bowl, amidst ornate granite shelves, undisturbed, aside from the snaggletooth pines that littered (or garnished) the slopes. Buried in the forest, the road wound around boulders and up and down hills until it intersected with the campground road, just past a creek trailhead. Far below the tree line, where the lake lay, nature flourished. Summer hadn’t been too hard on it this year, and even with the approach of fall on the horizon, summer flowers still bloomed in the low brush. Thick vats of trees interspersed brief meadows, the living fossils of old stream beds. Several types of firs and pines grew broad and tall, leaving needles on the otherwise soft forest floor. 

Sunlight glittered both between the trees and in the van’s windows, and it was positively perfect. Every so often Spencer would look back just to make sure everyone was doing all right, but internally he chided himself for being such a worry wart. Something made him necessitate everyone’s well being, because all in all, he just couldn’t bare the thought of his friends not having a good time. 

All his worries seemed to halt when Dallon said, “it’s beautiful,” in that light and dreamy voice, as if he’d never comprehended something so magnificent. Spencer was so caught up in his euphoria that he almost missed the turn off. He suspected cell service was officially gone, since the car had gotten quieter over the last few minutes. That, or his friends had taken a sudden interest in the flora. Luckily, it wasn’t another five minutes before they officially pulled into the campground.

So happy to have returned to his second home, Spencer began to narrate. “Welcome to my happy place.” He pointed to the right, where only a thin barrier of trees separated the road from the lake. “Right over here is where we’ll unload the kayaks, and just behind those shrubs is where the best beaches are. We’ll deal with that later, though.”

His passengers craned their necks for a better glimpse of the cool, sparkling water. 

Spencer drove extra slow for them. “And the side of the campground that we’re on, this side, is way better. There’s less sites, first of all, so there’s less noise at night, and you don’t feel super cramped in your campground. Most of the sites back up to open wilderness, and it really doesn’t get much better than that. Not to mention if you stay on this side you’re closer to the lake, it doesn’t need to be said why that rules,” he continued as he drove away from the lake, and down the only barely paved road toward the sites. 

Jon rolled down the window and stuck his head into the breeze. The scent of alpine air replaced the smells of fast food and sweat, and Spencer fell in love with nature again. He hoped his friends had too. The silence in the car had only a moment ago turned from bored to mystified, and whatever remainder of Spencer’s worries still lingered evaporated. 

While the nirvana lasted within, the bubbling excitement of finally arriving at the destination had accumulated long enough. At long last, Spencer pulled into the parking spot in front of his site and turned off the car. No thinking necessary, he flung himself out of the car and basked in the soft, cool sunlight that high elevation granted. 

Trees with red bark circled the camp, while just beyond knee high grasses flapped in the breeze. Faint traces of smoke from far off forest fires tinged the air not only in smell but also in sight. The visibility was just fine, but if one looked far enough out, they might mistake the smog for fog. Spencer didn’t dwell on it. It wasn’t like there was anything he could do about it. Besides, the day was warm and the sky was clear, and everyone around him seemed fucking PUMPED. He couldn’t help but join in. 

Clapping his hands together and cracking his knuckles simultaneously, Spencer opened up the trunk. Instead of getting right to work, he stood in place while his eyes took turns observing the overstuffed trunk and the great outdoors. He noticed the bathroom was down the road to the right, and the spigot was not too far to the left, twenty feet at max. 

Ryan was the only one to come by and offer assistance. Spencer handed him a few tent bags and requested he set them on the picnic table. 

“There have been times when I’ve caught myself wondering if you have any redeeming qualities—“ Ryan began cheerfully. Spencer picked up the empty cooler and sent Ryan a glare as they passed each other. 

“But, that’s only ever in really dire moments. Like when you knew Brendon was gonna drop a bucket of lube from a doorway and refused to warn me. But now I’m never going to be able to stay mad at you, because this place is the nicest fucking place I have ever been, and that’s all thanks to you. I don’t know what’s come over you.”

Spencer kept moving equipment to avoid Ryan noticing how misty-eyed he was. This place really was special, and it kept proving that to him, time after time. “Thanks, man,” he croaked. Ryan clapped a hand on his back and went back about his business. 

In the meanwhile, Spencer surveyed the remainder of the crap loaded in his truck and decided he really didn’t want to deal with any more of it at the moment. Instead, he grabbed his tent bag and walked off in search of a nice, shady spot to set it up. Toward the back of the campsite, past the bear box, past the picnic table, grill, and campfire, was a nice little hollow between a few trees, tucked just behind a fallen log, far in the process of decaying. 

The soft ground had a small dip in it, but he figured with all the padding they'd brought, he wouldn’t be able to notice it. He set the tent bag on the log and stretched out, breathing in deeply the smell of the wilderness. 

Dallon appeared at his side in silence. “Want some help?”

Spencer jumped in surprise and tripped over the log when he tried to catch himself, and ended up colliding with a tree. “What?” he asked, combing potential sap out of his hair while he regained he bearings. Dallon held out an arm to help him up. Spencer took the arm gladly. 

“I asked,” Dallon said slowly, as he wrapped his arm around Spencer’s waist. “If you want any help setting up the tent.”

Spencer wiped his hands on his pants. “Do you know how to set up a tent?”

“Admittedly, no.”

“Then why are you even offering?” Spencer laughed.

“Because I love you, dummy,” Dallon laughed back. 

If Spencer had been holding anything, it would’ve been dropped just as fast as his jaw. He stared in shocked silence and waited for Dallon to realize what he’d said, which only took a moment longer. Then both of them froze, staring at each other, desperate for words. 

“No— I, uh, what I meant was—“ Dallon spluttered. 

“I love you too,” Spencer smiled shyly. 

“Oh. Well, that’s um… that’s good news,” was all Dallon could say. It was better he didn’t keep going, because the way Spencer was staring urged him to lean in. Spencer got to the chase first, though. He leaned up and kissed him. Dallon put both hands on his hips, and in return Spencer cupped Dallon’s face with both hands. They pulled each other as close as they could get, and for a sweet, sweet moment, they were perfectly happy. 

Until somebody had the audacity to profusely honk Spencer’s one and only airhorn at the two of them, like this was Freaky Friday or some shit. 

For a split second, Spencer wasn’t bothered by it. Dallon tightened his grip on Spencer’s hips and pulled him in even closer, if at all possible. Spencer was .2 seconds away from hanging his arms around Dallon’s neck, but the horn was honked again, and Spencer’s pride didn’t recover. He broke the kiss to tackle whoever was trying to ruin his moment.

Dallon stayed behind to watch Spencer hurtle toward Brendon at full speed, because he exact moment when Brendon realized Spencer was coming for him was the single greatest thing he had ever witnessed. Brendon let go of the horn and bolted down the road, shrieking with laughter like a hyena. Spencer chased him a good ways down the road before giving up and returning like a soldier from the war. 

“I think you got him,” Dallon snorted.

Spencer was too busy heaving up his lungs to say anything snarky back, so he flipped him off and got to work. When he was able to explain with words, he instructed Dallon where and how to help, and in no time, their tent was up. Spencer stood to admire it while Dallon doubled back to the car to go get his things. He returned shouldering two duffle bags. 

“Home sweet home,” Spencer mumbled, taking his bag from Dallon. 

~

After all of their stuff was loaded into the tent and unpacked, Spencer couldn’t wait to get out and explore. Dallon reminded him that he should probably check on his clueless friends, given the fact that in all the time it had taken them to put up the tent and get unpacked, Ryan was still reading the tent instructions for his own tent. Now, Ryan wasn’t really the status quo for East High seniors, but the point was made. 

On route to check in on their friends, Dallon asked, “remind which sites are ours?”

Spencer checked what he’d written on his hand. “Ten, fourteen, and eighteen. I think the agreement goes that Patrick, Ray, Tyler, Josh, and Meagan are gonna stay in fourteen. And that leaves—“

Dallon interrupted. “Yeah, that’s gonna make site eighteen an absolute fuckfest, then. Correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s gonna be Frank and Gerard, right? And two people with least amount of self control, Pete and Mikey. Let’s not forget Hayley and Lindsey, Spencer.”

“To be fair, we don’t actually know if Lindsey and Hayley are together.”

Dallon sent him a look. “Yes, we do.” 

“Whatever. We’re not staying there, so it’s not our problem. Our problem is Brendon and Ryan. Jon seems like he can take care of himself,” Spencer replied, tripping over a rock.

“Maybe. I really wouldn’t worry about Brendon and Ry. They’ll be too stoned to do much of anything. Plus, if they can get away with doing it in class, they’ll be able to be quiet out here.”

“THEY WHAT—“ Spencer tripped over another rock. Dallon helped him up this time. 

“Yeah,” Dallon laughed. “He didn’t tell you about that?”

“Ryan doesn’t tell me shit, asshole,” Spencer said, dusting himself off. “The last time he did was when I met him, in preschool.” He could tell Dallon was waiting for him to continue the conversation, but his own words had gotten him thinking about something he was too scared to be thinking about for long. And he didn’t want to bring it down on Dallon, but he couldn’t keep thoughts like this to himself forever.

“Do you ever think about how we’ve only got… a year left?” he asked quietly. 

Dallon kept looking ahead as they walked down the path. His eyebrows arched in thought, as they always did when he was contemplating something. With a look so emotionless that Spencer’s blood drained from his face, Dallon looked at him. His eyes told him yes, he did think about that. And the way he grabbed Spencer’s hand and intertwined their fingers told him that he wasn’t ready for it either. 

Spencer looked up to the cloudless sky and reminded himself that they were untouchable out in the mountains, and that icky thoughts like such weren’t welcome here. So he straightened his posture and took a deep gulp of the fresh mountain air and searched for the words to amend what he’d said. 

“How about this,” he proposed, “for the rest of this trip, nobody is allowed to talk about that. All it’ll do is put a dampener on our good time, and I've worked too hard to let that fly, okay? So for one week, we are not allowed to talk about high school or anything after it. Sound good?”

Dallon blinked back tears and tried to breathe normally. “Sounds great.” He smiled and squeezed Spencer’s hand. He could do that, he told himself. Slowly, he realized that it wasn’t about keeping himself from thinking about it, it was dismantling the apprehensions all together. About finding a safe place where he didn’t have to worry about it. As luck would have it, Spencer had gone and found just the right place to forget about the world for a little while. Or maybe that was the plan all along. 

HONK! Dallon jumped nine feet in the air in surprise. Spencer had to pull him out of the road to let a car pass. He didn’t know how long that car had been following them. Oops. Just as well that they got stopped, as if they’d gone any further, they would’ve passed site number fourteen by. 

Meagan walked up to greet them and chatted pleasantly with Dallon, all the while Spencer was examining the campsite. He’d never had this one before. It was relatively more open than his own, with a few tall trees in a ring around the fire pit. The ground was littered with wood chips, like some asshole brought a chainsaw again. The entire camp was in a depression in the ground, several feet below the road, giving the campsite the impression of being very cozy, but in reality, the camp was spacious and exposed. For better or for worse, the site was theirs for the next week or so. 

“So, how was the drive?” Spencer overheard Dallon asking. 

“Not bad. Patrick and I talked for most of it. I mean, considering it was him and me, as well as the Ways, and Josh and Tyler up front, it could’ve gone a lot worse. Vegas wasn’t too bad,” she replied nonchalantly. Spencer wasn’t sure what kind of torture she’d undergone to be able to function with literally any randomly chosen group of people, no questions asked, but he admired her duality. 

“D’you need any help with anything? My doting husband reminded me I should probably see if anyone is as clueless as I deeply fear they are,” Spencer piped up, wrapping an arm around Dallon’s waist. 

“I don’t think so, but then again, I don’t speak for everyone. We’ve completely unloaded the cars, which counts for something. All the food is superheating in the bear box, and now the only thing left is the tents, and I’ve already got mine up. Everyone else is getting there. Want some snacks? I was just about to grab some hummus and pita chips,” Meagan offered, rummaging through the bear box.

“I’m good, there’s still one more camp for me to check on, and I am significantly more concerned for that one. Maybe later, though,” Spencer declined. Dallon agreed with him.

“No problem. Just swing back and let me know where we’re having nightly campfires, okay? Those are something I highly value, and I don’t intend to spend any nights here like a lightweight.”

“You and me both,” Spencer laughed, waving goodbye and meandering along the road once more, with Dallon still attached at the hip. “That could’ve gone worse,” he laughed.

“Yeah, going to Vegas, no biggie,” Dallon teased. 

“Oh, shut up. It’s not like you could’ve done any better.”

“I dunno… Give me a trip to lead and you’ll find out,” Dallon intoned.

“Ah, dahling! Now you’re talkin’. I’m thinking week in the Bahamas, how about you?” Spencer mocked, fanning himself. 

“You’re such a hypocrite.” Dallon laughed at Spencer laughing, and together they walked on, laughing at themselves. 

Down, down, down the road lay site eighteen, louder than all the of the other sites. So loud, that Spencer and Dallon heard it before it even came into sight. As they grew steadily near, all the sights and sounds of a land ruled by Chaotic Neutrals became ever so abundant. Not to mention the concentration of pure gay energy was so high it upset the balance of nature, slowly seeping into the trees until, hopefully, Mother Nature would confess her undying love to her girlfriend, the Sky. Spencer’s mind tended to wander like that when he was happy. 

A heavy-duty speaker sat on the bear box, cranked up so high that it rattled around like a dancer. It’s tunes were the first impression you got from the camp, and also likely the last thing you hear before you die. A fire in the fire pit was flaming sky high already, embers diving toward the ground with passion matched by the bops. Three colorful tents stood tall, two backed up against open woods, another on the opposite side of camp, back up to campsite seventeen. There was enough space, complimented by an intensely large boulder, between the two camps to not feel clustered together. Still, Spencer felt sorry for that camp. 

Further down, the road diverged, off toward the campground loop. The other turned into a parking space for camp eighteen, but that seemed like a lot of work, so Spencer and Dallon took the shortcut through the woods. They emerged into the campsite behind one of the tents. A muffled scream came from within as they grew closer. Lindsey burst out, yelling, 

“WATCH THE CORD!” 

Both boys stopped in their tracks, glancing around nervously, not sure what she was going off about. As far as Spencer could see, there was no cord. 

“The—the cord!” She gestured toward the rainfly string, connected to the ground to secure it wouldn’t blow away. “We’ve already had a few tripping accidents.” 

“When I said we were going on a trip…” Spencer mumbled, stepping gingerly over the cord. He walked father into the campsite, although now he was using a great deal of effort not to trip over any other hidden traps. The zipper on Lindsey’s tent wasn’t at all inconspicuous as she crawled out after them. Again, Spencer felt a pang of pity for site seventeen. 

The three of them gathered at the picnic table, where Gerard and Frank were already sitting. Frank hoarded a plate of crackers, intensely watching Gerard doodle in his sketchbook. Frank looked up and greeted Spencer and Dallon as they sat down, but Gerard kept on sketching, erasing, sketching, erasing. 

“I don’t think I need to ask how you are all settling in,” Spencer murmured, stealing a cracker. 

Frank gave him a thumbs up, then gestured around. “Look at this place! Spencer, I may have hated you last year, but I take it all back!” 

“You—what?”

“Good times,” Lindsey agreed. 

Spencer did the only thing he knew how to do and took it as a compliment. Dallon patted him lightly on the back, which felt more like a pity gesture than anything else. He fed Spencer a cracker to soothe the emotional void. Nothing fills the eternal sadness like Triscuits. 

“So, what’s new, Scooby Doo?” Spencer asked, mouth full of cracker mush. 

Lindsey also took a cracker. “Frank is Scooby Doo.”

“Explain,” Frank demanded, pulling his cracker plate closer. 

“Gerard is definitely a furry, so it makes sense,” she replied. Spencer did not like where this was leading.

“Please tell me you’re not implying that Shaggy fucks Scooby,” Dallon pleaded. 

“I mean…” Frank began. Everyone stared at him with sad, defeated eyes. “His name is Shaggy,” he whispered. 

“On that note… never mind,” Lindsey muttered. 

“I’m definitely not Shaggy,” said Gerard, speaking up for the first time. Why he picked this moment in the conversation to join in, Spencer didn’t ever want to know. Gerard pointed to the bathroom across the road, and Spencer, noticing Pete and Mikey walking out of it, knew exactly what Gerard was going to say before he even said it. 

“That one is Shaggy.” Gerard pointed to Mikey, who was wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, laughing at whatever terrible shit Pete had just said. The picnic table was suddenly very quiet. 

“That was so fast,” Frank whispered, eyebrows raised in surprise. 

“They only left five minutes ago,” Lindsey said to Spencer and Dallon, staring uncomfortably at the two walking toward them. 

“They’re sorta impressive sometimes,” Spencer replied, also very awestruck and kind of disgusted. He watched the two of them wander down the trail to the campsite and subsequently trip over the cord and faceplant. 

“Sometimes,” Spencer sighed, turning from one gay mess to another (the table). 

A sound of outrage, likely due to the disturbance, came from the tent. Hayley, looking very outraged indeed, poked her head out of the tent. She glared at Pete and Mikey, who became very silent and very still upon noticing the anger in her eyes. Then Hayley turned to Lindsey and cocked an eyebrow. All Lindsey could do was wave back shyly. 

“What were you doing before we got here? What exactly did we interrupt?” Spencer asked, like that was entirely his business. 

“Oh, we were napping,” Lindsey replied, watching Hayley zip herself back into the tent. There was a thud like a body collapsing on a sleeping bag, and then nothing but the birds in the trees and the wind. 

Spencer watched Lindsey for a second, trying to figure out what felt off about that moment, but he couldn’t quite place it. Brendon’s influence on him had his gaydar beeping like mad, but he ignored it. 

Mikey and Pete finally figured out how to step over the cord and sauntered over to the picnic table, where everyone was not so excitedly waiting for them. 

“‘Sup shit-monkeys,” Pete formally greeted them, “Oh! Crackers!” 

“Keep your dick fingers off of my sin free crackers, you heathen,” Frank hissed,

Pete put his hand on his hip. “Sin free? Your sad ass vegan crackers are a sin,” Pete replied. 

While Frank was distracted, arguing with Pete about whatever-the-fuck, Mikey squeezed in between him and Gerard, and began to eat said crackers. He got half way through them before Frank noticed. 

“WHY DOES EVERYONE WANT MY CRACKERS?!” he screamed, shoveling the rest of the crackers into his mouth before any other dick fingers—or anything else, for that matter—could get a hold of them. He snatched up his empty plate and trudged away, grumbling. 

“Well,” Spencer, who really wanted to go now, said, clapping his hands together like he was a chaperone, “everything’s looking mighty gay, and that’s a good sign to me.”

“You would say that,” Pete scrutinized. “You don’t know the meaning of being g—holySHITisthatabear?” 

Everyone at the table shot up to see what he’d seen. Spencer knew for a fact that the only bears here were Black Bears, exceptionally weak-ass little guys, and also that Pete was notoriously a dumbass, but even he looked. 

“Pete, there’s only one type of bear here, and he’s in camp site fi—“ Spencer stopped. Even though the odds were against him, he looked a little harder because for a second there, he thought he saw it too.

“Shit, what is that?” he whispered, hopping off the bench to take a closer look. 

“Gee, it’s your kin!” Lindsey whispered, nudging from from across the table. 

“Lindsey, you know DAMN WELL that my kin is a bat,” he replied, not taking his eyes off the woods. 

“Damn, that’s emo,” Dallon scoffed. 

Without warning, Pete jumped off the table, punting Frank’s cracker plate into Narnia, and sprinted into the woods in search of the “bear”. 

“GONNA CATCH ME A BEAR!” he screeched, vaulting over logs and bushwhacking to the extreme. 

Looking sullen over his absentee plate, Frank sped off after him, yelling, “Honey! I’m gonna go catch us some dinner!” 

The rest of the group was left to wonder whether Frank meant Pete or the bear. Best of all, Gerard and Mikey appeared to be the least concerned of all of them. In fact, Spencer watched as Mikey dug through the box of kitchen stuff at the end of the table and pulled out Frank’s box of Triscuits. 

Before any more fuckery could go down, Dallon took charge. He not so subtly wrapped his arm around Spencer and yawned animatedly. Spencer was fortunately fluent in Dallon, which meant he got the message, which, minus all of the obscenities, translates to, “I’d like to leave now”. Spencer was equally interested in not getting roped into any more terrible plots. 

“On that note,” Spencer raised his voice, inching slowly away from the table. “We’re gonna let you all finish settling in. Just a heads up, we’re all gonna check out the lake later on today, so if you wanna test out the waters, maybe start putting on your suits. Uh, yeah. Please don’t let Pete or Frank kill the bear. I’m pretty sure that’s illegal.”

“Not any more illegal than all the drugs I’m gonna do as soon as you leave,” Lindsey replied, voice gravelly and sultry. 

Spencer and Dallon backed away slowly, giving the cord a wide berth, before bursting into laughter once on the road.

“Oh, God,” Dallon hissed, giggling. “We’re so fucked. This is gonna go horribly, no offense.”

Spencer agreed with him, unfortunately, but that didn’t stop him from laughing at it while he still could. When finally he could breathe, he said, “Tyler went to Vegas, Good Fellow Blow Job hath taken control of bathroom three, and Brendon’s probably already slammed. Wow, I am so royally fucked,” he wheezed. Then Dallon started laughing again, which only made Spencer laugh harder. Tears pricked the corners of his eyes. 

“My parents don’t know I invited this many people. I told them one or two. Pete’s single handedly responsible for getting me grounded for life,” he snickered sadly.

Dallon nearly crashed into a tree. 

Spencer hit him lightly, still cracking up. “Don’t laugh at me! You’re never gonna see me again!” 

Dallon only laughed harder. 

“I’m gonna hide your body in a ditch, right alongside the bear Pete’s harassing,” Spencer chuckled, wiping tears of laughter off of his face. 

“I’m… staying… with… Jon,” Dallon cried, hugging his side stitch.

“Fine,” Spencer laughed, “be that way!” he started to walk off by himself, but kept wobbling from laughing so hard, and decided to give up after he nearly got his by a car. Dallon caught up with him and wrapped an arm around his waist like a seat belt, since apparently Spencer didn’t know the rules of traffic safety any better than Jon. Together, laughing like hyenas, they made their way back to camp, slowly but surely. 

They made their way to the tent, conveniently nestled between two tall, broad trees. Shade from the low hanging branches swatched the tent, keeping it cool in the mid afternoon heat. 

“Spencer, can you shut up?” Dallon scolded, laughing in spite of himself.

“I didn’t say anything,” Spencer refuted, unzipping the tent and nose diving inwards. 

“You’ve been chanting ‘snacks’ the entire walk back, dumbass,” Dallon explained, climbing in after him. “Do you not hear yourself when you speak?” He zipped up the tent and turned to Spencer, awaiting an answer. 

“That would account for a lot of the shit I’ve started.” 

“It would,” Dallon agreed, face planting into his pillow. The two of them took a second to process what had just happened.

“That is a sock—“ Spencer began.

“This is a sock!” Dallon agreed, sitting up and thrusting the sock away from himself. He squished the pillow between his arms and nestled his face in it, pleasantly observing Spencer as he went about his business. At the moment, that consisted of digging a box of cereal out of the bear can. The “bear can” is a plastic tub used to keep backpacking food safe from bears and other vermin, but this one only contained snacks that they didn’t want to share with anyone else. 

“Cinnamon Toast Crunch or Trix?” Spencer asked.

“Cronch.”

“Monch it is.” Spencer pulled out the box and unpackaged it, sitting criss-crossed on his sleeping bag. the sweet smell of cinnamon sugar wafted out, not mixing perfectly with the scent of the great outdoors. Dallon’s nose kinda felt like eating a salad in a McDonald’s. Wasn’t quite right. But obviously, no amount of weird smells was going to stop him from going ape-shit on that box of cereal. 

He nudged Spencer with his foot. “Feed me.” 

Spencer took one single square out of the box and threw it at him, and to everyone’s surprise, he caught it in his mouth. Dallon, chewing madly, sat up and pumped his fists in the air, Spencer laughing stupidly in the corner. Craving more Crunch, Dallon snatched up the box while he still could, and cradled it tightly. When Spencer ‘came to’, he didn’t even make an effort to get it back.

“Fine, you keep it. I’ve moved on anyway,” he said spitefully. Up next from the bear can of delight was a gallon bag of dried apple slices, soft and chewy like candy. 

In silence, the two of them chowed down on their snacks. They were probably ruining their dinners, but city food was unfairly addicting out there. Unconsciously, Spencer and Dallon rolled around until they were laying parallel, snacking merrily. It really wasn’t awkward in the quiet, because even in the woods it’s never perfectly quiet. There’s birds chirping, wind blustering, Brendon screaming from within the bear box… the usual. To be fair, it’s what he deserved after attempting to whack Jon with an electric bug zapper. 

Part of Spencer’s brain urged him to be concerned that a ranger might drop by after hearing Brendon’s screaming from within his Shame Cube, but Spencer enjoyed the background noise more. Snickering every now and then at the muffled wails, he rolled onto his side to face Dallon. Dried apple slice in hand, Spencer reached up to feed it to Dallon. 

“You’re so lame,” Dallon sighed, accepting the fruit and smiling so wide that his eyes glittered and crinkled around the edges. 

Spencer rested his hand on Dallon’s face, using the back of his palm to stroke his cheek softly. He was mostly too lazy to pull his hand back, but sure, it was a kind-hearted gesture. And it worked, if the intention was to get a kiss. 

“Oh, boy,” Dallon whispered, leaning in without hesitation. He pulled back just as quickly and popped another hand full of cereal into his mouth. He watched with interest as Spencer tried to compute what had just gone down. Sometimes when he took Spencer by surprise, he got all frozen like an overheated computer, and Dallon lived for it. Seeing the opportunity before him, he took it by all means. 

“I can’t believe I controlled myself around you for so long. Sometimes you’d say something, or look at me funny, and I thought I’d die if I didn’t kiss you. Y’know, sometimes I still feel like that,” Dallon cooed, watching Spencer’s ears get redder with every word he said. 

Dallon was just trying to get to him and he knew it, but damn, Spencer thought, he was fucking good at it. He could feel his heart skip a few beats here and there, and how hot his face was getting, how strong that lump in his throat was becoming, and those dial up internet sounds in his brain. 

“Gonna be real with you chief,” Spencer choked out. 

Dallon rolled his eyes. “Don’t—“

“I am incredibly gay right now—“ He barely finished his sentence before he pressed his lips onto Dallon’s like some kind of madman. 

Being the sucker he was, Dallon squealed with laughter and flung his arms around Spencer’s neck lovingly. He used his movements to be as dramatic as possible, still laughing as Spencer pulled away to breathe. 

“I came here for a good time and I get this?!” Dallon jokingly complained. 

“Yeah, it’s a two-for-one!” Spencer agreed, reaching over and stealing back the box of cereal before it faded from memory and inevitably spilled onto everything when they got careless. 

“You’re so dumb,” Dallon mumbled, repressing the hell out of a smile. What followed was a long conversation, expressed only in eye contact, spanning about ten seconds. It was broken by Dallon breaking into that repressed smile and burying his face in his real pillow. 

“Those are still socks,” Spencer noted. 

“Where are all these socks coming from?” Dallon whined, tossing them to the other end of the tent. 

“Come here,” Spencer laughed pitifully, pulling Dallon over to his half of the tent. He wasn’t sure why all of the sudden he’d been so overcome with sleepiness, but he wanted nothing more than to cuddle up with his boyfriend and fall asleep underneath the mottled afternoon sunlight. So first and foremost, he made sure the cereal was safely stowed away before allowing himself to become an human blanket. Wrapped around a warm body, lovingly. Dallon nestled into the crook of his neck and kissed his collar gently. Relaxed by nature’s authentic quiet, his breathing began to slow. His muscles relaxed. He shut his eyes. 

After a few minutes of stillness, Dallon stirred. “We just gonna sleep?” he asked groggily, squeezing Spencer to make sure he was still awake. 

“Nap, not sleep.”

“No more nurturing your friends into nature freaks? Nothing left on the to-do list, Mr. Party Planner?” Dallon mocked wearily. His words were barely coherent, so Spencer assumed he was generally okay with taking a snooze. 

“Don’t think so… that all right?” Spencer asked, slurping to make sure he wasn’t drooling. 

Dallon buried his face in Spencer’s chest and kicked his shoes off. “Absolutely.”

~

They were awoken not two hours later by Meagan, who was, for some ungodly reason, tapping on their tent.

“Hey, boys. I almost didn’t want to wake you, you looked so cute,” she cooed

“Then why did you?” Spencer grumbled, not bothering to face her or even open his eyes. He ran his fingers through Dallon’s hair, as if that would somehow tell him if he was awake yet. 

“Well, a couple of the bros wanted to head down to the lake to set up and—“ 

Spencer shot up, scrambling to find his shoes, then flung himself out of the tent. meagan called after him, but he only heard the blood rushing through his ears. He grabbed his towel from the laundry string— a literal piece of rope tied to two trees, for the sole purpose of air drying articles of clothing. He made a break for the road, but doubled back for some precious cargo. he flung open the doors to the bear box and hauled Brendon out, screaming,

“ONWARDS, BRENDON! WE MUST CONQUER WHAT IS RIGHTFULLY OURS!” 

Meagan made a face. “The last person to say that was Christopher Columbus, Spencer.”

“Do you think this is a game, Meagan?!” Spencer shouted. 

While Spencer was yelling, Brendon snatched up a couple of beach chairs and the one and only air horn before being pulled off toward the lake by Spencer— adrenaline composition, 1,000%. 

Spencer knew one thing mattered— getting his spot at the lake. Not that he’d brag or anything, but it was kinda tradition. Every year since he’d started coming to this lake when he was very young, they’d had the same spot by the lake. A nice little grove, circled with pine trees, intersected by a trail, and divided nicely into a portion of soft, mossy grass, and another of warm, smooth stone. The soft ground made for a sweet, shady spot to relax and eat food, while the rocks were good for sun tanning and warming up after a dip in the lake. It was his spot, and God forbid anyone take that from him. 

Realizing his urgency wouldn’t get across if he were to run there on foot, Brendon made the executive decision to “borrow” their neighbor’s bike, just for a little while. He rung the bell wildly as he overtook Spencer in the race toward the lake. 

“Hurry up, slowpoke! If you want that spot in time you’ve gotta keep up, even if I don’t know why we’re rushin’,” Brendon laughed, pedaling calmly alongside Spencer. 

“If you wanna know why we’re Russian, then share that bike with me. It’s a lesson in communism,” Spencer huffed, his lack of past exercise taking a sudden and obvious toll. 

“That’s my second favorite kink, right after piss,” Brendon replied, slowing to a stop on the side of the road. He struggled to maintain control of the bike as Spencer clambered on grabbing his hair in an attempt to hold steady. At last the two took off again, just as Meagan and Dallon thought they had a chance of catching up. Now pedaling as fast as possible, Brendon relished in the wind, pushing his body to greater and greater lengths until, nearly completely exhausted, he stopped the bike at the dock.

Funnily enough, they noticed Lindsey and Ray taking down the kayaks and hauling them to the water’s edge for docking. But they had no time to chat. Spencer readjusted his chair bags to make sure everything was in place, then took off through the bushes. He trampled off the asphalt to the dirt trail, and in another moment he was in the midst of his beach— empty and quiet and ready to party. 

Spencer pumped his fists in the air excitedly and Brendon, who was observing this space for the first time, shared his enthusiasm. Because to the left spread the wide, open lake, reflecting the white granite mountains, blue sky, and sunlight. The water’s edge lapped at the shore, sunken a foot beneath the hot rocks, making soft, gurgling noises. He noticed a shadow fly over the lake, and as he narrowed his eyes at the source, he determined it to be an Osprey. He’d never seen one of those before. 

“Wow,” he muttered, as though he gave a shit about birds. He didn’t. But the water certainly had his attention. Unable to take his eyes off the scenery, he hiked over the rocks onto a bluff overlooking the water. The drop was maybe three feet maximum, but he knew it would feel excellent to push someone off of it nonetheless. To get a frame of reference, he went to the water’s edge and was about to step in when his good friend Spencer kindly reminded him he was still wearing his shoes. So he squatted down and untied his shoelaces first. 

“It’s gonna be cold, just warning you,” Spencer chuckled knowingly, a ways back in the clearing. Brendon ignored his good advice, as usual, and Spencer was incredibly tempted to push him over into the drink… but thought better of it. For now. Brendon was too far along for him to get away with it. 

Brendon’s sweaty feet exited his shoes with what felt like a sigh of relief, and instantly shriveled under the strikingly cold lake water, the moment he dipped them in. Just for the hell of it, Brendon screamed as loud and as high as he could, which echoed off the mountains back to him. 

“Holy SHIT THAT’S COLD!” Brendon hopped back out of the water as soon as he’d finished his scream. He stood on the hot rocks to warm himself up while Spencer laughed mercilessly in front of him. He had to back himself somehow, because his reputation just wouldn’t survive if he didn’t. Then again… what reputation? The one for being a dumbass? In that case, it was well protected, he thought to himself. “Man! That was sick!” Brendon hopped to a new spot, having exhausted all the heat from the last one. “I’ve gotta get people down here! Did you see that bird? Oh, wow, I can’t wait to get this party going. I’m so hyped!”

“You sound like Ray from Ghostbusters,” Spencer snickered.

“This is phenomenal, Venkman! Did you see that full-bodied apparition over the lake? It could fly! I’ve gotta get Spengler! And Zeddmore!” Brendon mimicked, shoving his wet feet back into his shoes like some sort of caveman. Without a moment’s hesitation, he raced out of the clearing to go find some reinforcements. 

Spencer decided to enjoy the tranquility while it lasted. Which, as he predicted, wasn’t very long. Less than five whole minutes or genuine silence later, the hoarded encroached. He could hear them before he could see then— laughing and shrieking from down the road, shoes scuffling against the gravelly pavement, swearing and cursing like sailors. 

Blowing in like a tsunami, his friends entered the grove, ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the sights. Spencer kept his eyes shut while everyone got adjusted. He could feel dust rising from all the feet messing up the dry ground, and he started to sneeze. That finally drew him out of his peaceful reserve. 

Spencer removed himself from his chair and chose the rock by the water’s edge to make his official address to his subjects. 

“AHEM!” he called, speaking out above the white noise chatter. “If I could have your eyes and ears please, children.”

Everyone glared at him, but hey, whatever works. 

“You’re probably wondering why I’ve gathered you all here today.”

Frank booed.

Spencer flipped him off as he continued. “It’s been a long day and a radical adventure to get here. Tyler went to Nevada; Lindsey fought a redneck; Hayley threw up so many times she broke the world record… but we’re here nonetheless. Which is why I wanted to formally… to officially… welcome you all to paradise!” The party cheered, and caught up in the attention and the glory he was getting, Spencer didn’t notice Dallon creeping up to his left. Critical mistake. He only noticed when he felt a shove to his side and at that point he was already falling into the lake. 

As he fell, the sounds of jubilation increased and when he hit the cold water and submerged, he could hear several more bodies trampling into the waves after him. He breached the surface, shouting, “DALLON, YOU DICKHEAD, WHAT IF I’D HAD MY PHONE!?” as he spat out lake water. Dallon was laughing too hard to hear him, so Spencer decided to make himself heard. He snagged Dallon by the wrist and yanked him off the rock as well. Both of them went flying back into the water, and Spencer didn’t feel the tiniest bit of remorse when he heard the smack of a belly flop. 

Dallon wiped his soggy emo fringe out of his face. “That could’ve gone so poorly,” he remarked. 

Spencer rubbed his eyes. “Shut the fuck up Dallon, you started it,” he laughed. He couldn't get another word in before the number one asshole, Pete, cannonballed practically in between them, nearly killing both of them in the process. 

“All right, Pete,” Spencer hissed under his breath, “time to drown.” Again interrupted, Spencer was about to dive in and drown his good friend, when Josh piped up from twenty feet away. 

“Spence! Why does it get colder and deeper in the middle? Like, the banks are so much warmer,” he yelled. 

“This whole lake used to be a flooded meadow, meaning where the initial stream was in now much deeper than the rest of the lake,” Spencer recited, having said this a billion times to a billion different people over the years. 

“A channel?” Jon asked, treading water. 

Spencer nodded and looked down into the deep, dark water. He’d been coming here for years, but somehow every time he looked down into the depths, he was seven years old again, watching Jaws come up from the depths. That was enough lake for today. 

Spencer left Dallon to be consumed by the beast that definitely lurked in the depths. It wasn’t really appreciated. But what was worse was the exact moment that Spencer crawled out of the water and felt the cold wind against his skin. He grappled with his towel and plopped down in the sun, pressing as much of himself as he could against the hot rocks. This was maybe the only feeling he didn’t ever miss too much. 

Dallon skip-hopped out of the lake as well, rubbing his arms for warmth. 

“You didn’t bring a towel, did you?” Spencer asked, smiling pityingly. 

Dallon shook his head. 

Spencer reached out and offered up some of his own towel, because that’s what boyfriends do, he was pretty sure. Even if the towel was a little damp already. 

Dallon sat down next to him and together they shook and tried to warm up. They watched as their friends made their way out of the lake on their own time, until eventually everyone was sitting down either on the rocks or the soft grass, trying to stop their teeth from chattering. 

“You didn’t m-mention the l-lake would b-be so c-cold,” Mikey grimaced, wrapped up like a burrito.

“It’s not the water, dipshit. It’s the air,” Spencer replied, shaking the water out of his hair like a dog. Dallon didn’t appreciate it and revoked Spencer’s towel privileges. “Besides,” Spencer said, playing tug-of-war with Dallon for the towel. “You’ve got like 0% body fat, no wonder you’re freezing.” Spencer yanked the towel and Dallon lurched over, nearly landing face first on a stray fishing hook. 

Spencer deserved the glare he got. “Oh, and by the way, everyone,” he picked up the fishhook carefully. “Keep an eye out. Most fisher-people take their shit with them, but there’s always a select few…” He dangled it by the line still attached to it. 

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Pete murmured, eyes wide with disgust. 

Spencer scoffed in agreement and set it next to him, where he’d either remember it, or remember it after it was lodged in his palm. He looked around at his friends and nodded in approval. Things were looking good. 

Most people had forgotten to bring towels, so they were shivering in the sun, but other than that, everyone looked happy. Although, Gerard definitely looked the happiest, being that he was perfectly dry. His hair was pulled back into a bun and his sunglasses were so regal that Spencer was at a loss for words. He decided not to ask why Gerard didn’t go swimming. However, it seemed Gerard had been kind enough to bring Frank a towel since there was no way in hell that Frank remembered one on his own. 

“Well,” Lindsey said, drawing Spencer away from his thoughts. “Even if every moment after this one sucks ass, I’ll still call this trip a success because that? Was fucking AWESOME!” She rolled back onto the grass and splayed out. “Anyone else kinda wanna bang mother nature?” 

“All the time.”

“Yes, of course.”

“Obviously.”

“Just checkin’,” Lindsey laughed, laying her forearm across her eyes to block out the sun. 

Spencer laughed quietly and Dallon put his head down on Spencer’s shoulder. Dallon’s hair tickled his shoulder but he didn’t dare move because he thought his heart might explode. They’d both stopped shaking by now, so his mind started to focus on something else. His stomach grumbled.

“God, I miss fast food already,” he snickered. But that gave him an idea. “How hungry are we?” he asked the group. 

After a second of deliberation, as one voice everyone replied, “Very.”

“Dinner it is, then,” Spencer exclaimed. He hated to move Dallon but if there was one thing that came before Dallon, it was food. Spencer gingerly picked up the hook and held it tightly by the line. 

Hayley trotted over to him. “Where are we cooking?” she asked, tying her hair back in a ponytail. 

Spencer stood as he thought and gave Dallon a hand up. “How about my site? I think my bear box has most of the food, and it would just be a hassle to move it around.”

“Fair enough, see you soon, Ramsey,” Hayley smiled, draping her towel around her neck. 

“And you, Ratatouille,” Spencer laughed, unable to think of any other chefs. 

“HIS NAME IS REMY!” Hayley yowled, trudging away. 

“Yeah, Spencer,” Dallon laughed. “Show some respect.”

“Don’t you start.” Spencer wasn’t capable of not laughing.

~

In Spencer’s opinion, not setting up a kitchen space when he’d had a decent opportunity was a mistake. Because when he got to the campsite, sopping wet and freezing, and had to unpack all of the gear in the shade, he nearly contracted hypothermia. He really may have, if Dallon hadn’t interrupted and forced him to go change in the tent. 

It was a lot easier in jeans and a t-shirt. Hayley showed up with a few helpers, and it was smooth sailing. Dallon didn’t really know how to cook, so he just sat on the side and looked pretty. Dallon really fit the bill when Spencer joking tossed his a piece of charcoal and Dallon caught it, and then nearly ate it before he realized what it was. Spencer nearly lit the entire campground on fire because he was laughing so hard that he forgot about the lit stop and instead collapsed on the ground. 

Hayley had had enough by that point and pushed Spencer aside. Without Spencer’s distractions, the grill and the stove were up and running and dinner was on its way. Hayley sentenced Spencer to chopping vegetables when he finally agreed to cooperate. 

“Thank you so much, Ratatootie,” Spencer said, chopping beets mindlessly. 

“No problem, Chunky Cheese,” she replied, flipping whatever was on the grill. Spencer snorted and nearly put his face down in the beets. 

“Stop it, you almost got some on you,” Dallon chastised when Spencer got dangerously close to the beets. “Hey, what are those, anyway? Did God invent, like, new vegetables or something?”

Even Hayley, twenty feet away, stopped what she was doing to stare at Dallon. 

“Are you telling me you’ve never had a beet before?” Spencer asked incredulously. 

“I mean, I’ve heard of them, but yeah, I guess,” he laughed stupidly. Hayley looked into an invisible camera like she was on The Office, then returned to managing the grill, looking disappointed at everything. 

“Here, try one,” Spencer said, offering Dallon a cube of uncooked beet. He knew damn well they tasted like rocks when they were uncooked, but that wasn’t his problem. 

Dallon let Spencer feed it to him and instantly made a face. “This is terrible,” he said, chewed beet staining his teeth red. He got up to spit it out but Hayley made a threatening gesture at him with her spatula. 

“Do not spit it out, finish it and swallow it. Be a big kid.”

“Thank you, Hayley, you just made our sex life one-hundred percent better!” Spencer joked. 

Dallon whirled around, “I’m gonna spit this on you,” he warned, making a break for Spencer.

Spencer up-ended himself from the picnic table and bolted. Dallon wasn’t about to give up that easily, and chased him down the road. 

Hayley put her face in her palm and took a deep breath, laughing to herself. As she turned back to her grill, there was a shriek from the road and Spencer’s roar of laughter as, Hayley assumed, Dallon accidentally spat beets on someone other than Spencer. 

“If they don’t get married I’ll never believe in love ever again,” Lindsey snickered, stirring a large pot of something on the portable stove. 

“Yeah, their love is really exemplified by the age old tradition of spitting chewed food on your loved one,” Hayley replied, notching the spatula on the grill and hopping up onto the bear box. She watched as Lindsey inched over toward the beets and put a cube in her mouth. She started to chew.

“Don’t you fucking dare, Lindsey,” she warned, sliding off the bear box and backing up. “This shirt is easily stained.” 

Lindsey took slow steps forward, a shit-eating grin on her face. 

Hayley didn’t wait another second. She took off into the woods, with Lindsey right on her tail, trying desperately, with all her might, not to choke on the beet mush in her mouth. 

Spencer and Dallon walked back into camp, along with Meagan, Ray, and well as Patrick, who was very much covered in beet stains. Ray was just happy it hadn’t been him for once. 

Spencer sat back down at the table, picked up his knife, and continued chopping up beets, now very weary of Dallon. 

Patrick picked up the spatula left hanging on the grill and prodded at the grilling food. “Where did the Hayley and Lindsey go? I swear I saw them on the walk over here,” he asked, effectively taking over grilling duties. 

“Probably to do nasty shit in the woods,” Meagan joked, peeping into the frothing pot of who-the-fuck-knows on the stove. 

“Holy hell, are you for real? So, they’re actually together? That’s confirmed?” Ray asked, plopping down next to Dallon. 

“It was just a joke, dude. You’d think I was a guy with how little I know about girls,” Meagan replied, not meaning to be shady. 

“You’re not wrong. I have a girlfriend and I don’t know shit about girls,” Ray sighed. 

Everyone momentarily paused. “You do?” asked everybody, as one, loud voice. 

“Yeah. Her name is Christa. You know her, right?” he asked Meagan.

“Hell yeah, I do! Wow, I can’t decide who’s luckier, you, or her.”

“Definitely me,” Ray replied, looking away dreamily. “Speaking of which, is there anywhere here I can get cell reception? She wanted me to call her when I got here safely.”

“Yeah, of course. Go down to the right a little ways and when you hit the fork in the road, go left, up the mountain. Just follow the road up until you get reception,” Spencer replied, packaging up his desiccated beets in layers of tinfoil. 

Ray nodded a thanks and took off, clutching his phone proudly. 

Dallon sighed once he was out of earshot. “The evil is defeated. This is now a gays only event,” he said, going horizontal on the picnic table bench. 

Meagan rolled her eyes, but Patrick masculinity hadn’t recovered so well. 

“Bold of you to assume I’m not stra—“

The rest of sites 14 and 18 noisily filed into camp, led by Gerard in his usual weirdly-stylish grunge attire. And “not-so-straight” Patrick shut up promptly and stared pointedly at the grill. Spencer’s head nearly exploded over his revelation alone, but he decided now was not the time to bully his friends. 

Spencer wasn’t given time to worry about their blatant underage drinking before he himself had some shitty, low-cost American beer in his hands. Hayley and Lindsey reappeared, likely having heard the ruckus at site 10, and Hayley was covered in dark red stains that Spencer was not prepared to ask about. So, he turned back toward the grill, where his vegetable packs were slowly roasting, and tried not to think about it.

“So, Spencer,” Pete began, hoisting himself up onto a tree stump because he liked to pretend he was tall, “have you any plans of madness to procure?”

“A few, but I’m not sure they’re worth it. We are here to have a good time, you know.”

“Oh, God, Dallon’s turned you into a sap,” Pete groaned into his PBR.

“And Mikey’s turned you into even more of a cunt, what else is new,” Spencer laughed. 

Pete snorted into his beer, not offended in the slightest. ‘Cause Spencer wasn’t exactly wrong. “I was gonna make some comment about you being turned into a flaming gay by Dal’ but… I guess we both have a thing for string bean boys with bad attitudes.” 

“Truer words have never been spoken,” Hayley snickered, scooting in between the two of them to check on her contribution to the meal. She gave them a quick once-over. (The meat, not the boys). Then she pushed Pete off the stump and hollered at the entire site. “GET YOUR UTENSILS, DINNER’S IN FIVE!” 

Spencer wandered over to his tent and fell inside with a thump. A good rummage in his day pack delivered him his three-in-one knife, fork, spoon combo trinket. And after a breeze blew through the tent, he grabbed his jacket as well. He was almost out of the tent when he was winded by compulsion to be kind and get Dallon’s jacket too. Maybe Pete was right, he thought, maybe he was getting sappier. Or, you know, maybe he was just not being an asshole anymore. Spencer snuck up behind Dallon and put the jacket on his shoulders for him, before pressing his lips onto Dallon’s cheek. Spencer didn’t really mind not being an asshole.

There wasn’t enough space at the picnic table to hold all nine-billion or so of them, so some poor soul had to make a run back to the other two sites to grab beach chairs. Spencer, being the orchestrator of everything, was guaranteed a seat at the table, and no one dared fight Dallon for his spot either. 

Either everyone was much more hungry then they realized prior or the food was just insanely good, because every became mysteriously quiet once eating commenced. Frank, still in a food daze, held up two green beans. 

“Look, look they’re like Mikey’s legs,” he snickered, sounding half-drunk. 

“Or Lindsey’s long ass fingers,” Patrick piped up, winking at Lindsey. 

“Oh, please,” Lindsey sighed. “God gave me long fingers for two reasons: so I can play bass better than anyone else here, and so I can finger her like mad when I get to Heaven.”

Stunned silence filled the bug net surrounding the picnic table. 

“Are… are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Dallon asked, pretending he wasn’t chewing with his mouth full.

“About God being a woman? I stand by that—“

“No, I think he meant the fingering part,” Spencer clarified, trying to act normal in the wake of a possibly huge announcement. 

“Oh. Have I ever admitted to anything in my whole entire life? No. But what I want to know is if you’re saying that you wouldn’t finger God. Because… that’s not okay for anyone of any sexuality to admit.”

“I mean… You’ve got me there,” Patrick mumbled, staring, embarrassed, at his dinner. 

“Exactly,” said Lindsey proudly. 

Spencer and Dallon shared a look and went back to their food. 

~

After dinner, it was settled that the first campfire of the trip should be held at site 18, as it was the most isolated noise-wise. People wandered like zombies up the road, still in full food-coma mode. Spencer was among them, carrying his chair, and sure as hell not doing dishes because he’d made dinner, fuck you. 

He caught up with Brendon and the two chatted the whole way to their destination. As much as the two of them would’ve loved a rad, opening night rager, nobody was in the mood. After a long day of driving—which really is so much more tiring than anyone had realized—and after all of that food, the most going on was a speaker playing stoner tunes and a couple more cans of PBR being passed around. And that really didn’t sound all that bad to Spencer. He set up a chair and took his place in the circle, graciously accepting the last few sips of lukewarm beer. Someone had managed to light a fire, and that was the only thing that mattered. Time seemed to speed up as he settled in.

The sky darkened slowly, revealing a multitude of stars, glittering white and yellow against the deepening hue of the Milky Way. The shadows of the trees grew longer in the firelight. Laughter and gentle chatter bounced off of rocks and pines back to him. The colder it got, the cozier he felt, bundled up in his jacket. He kept his feet pressed against the rim of the fire pit, just barely melting the rubber soles. He really was at peace.

Dallon nearly missed s’more time, but luckily Spencer kept everyone distracted until Dallon came along. 

“I forgot to bring a chair,” Dallon giggled, crouching down on the ground next to Spencer. 

“You can share with me,” Spencer offered. “And when the chair inevitably breaks we can just leave.”

“Sounds like a bad plan that will end up with both of us in the fire,” Dallon replied, sitting on Spencer’s lap anyway. Dallon positioned Spencer’s hands like a seatbelt around himself, and snuggled him. 

“This plan wasn’t well thought out at all. How can we make s’mores?” Spencer asked. 

“As one,” Dallon insisted, laughing quietly as he moved Spencer’s arms like a puppet on a string. 

While that didn’t work and did almost end with the both of them in the fire pit, they did get to eat some s’mores and everything was looking hunky dory. Up until there was a snap and the chair collapsed in on itself, leaving Dallon and Spencer nearly impaled and on the ground. That was the sign they’d been waiting for to leave. They said their goodnights and left their friends with the remains of the chair. 

“We don’t have to go to bed if you’re not tired,” Spencer said, staring up at the moon peeking through the trees. 

Dallon yawned. “I am tired, though. I’m so fucking tired that I think my body’s in shock and that’s the only reason I’m still standing.” 

Spencer choked on a laugh and wrapped an arm around Dallon to help keep him upright. They walked the short distance to their site intertwined, using the light from the sky to keep them on the right path. The one thing Spencer always forgot about the wilderness was the light. Even at night, the moon’s rays kept everything illuminated perfectly. Spencer didn’t even trip over the log in front of their tent like he’d expected himself to. 

The two boys crammed into the tent and stretched out, feeling the weight of their exhaustion bear down on them. Spencer almost didn’t have the energy to change into pajamas before he collapsed. He felt Dallon laugh at how pathetic he was, as he scooted down into the depths of his sleeping bag, where he could consolidate the most warmth. 

“Good day, dear?” Spencer asked jokingly, no longer able to keep his eyes open. 

“Oh, yes. Quite wonderful.” Dallon grabbed Spencer’s hand and intertwined their fingers. And just like that, Spencer was out cold.


	3. Swimming! Crunching! Excitement?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meat Andy and Joe ft. bullying Patrick

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise this chapter is about Josh

The first time Josh woke up was at 6:45 when the sun came up. He put a shirt over his face and fell back asleep without hesitation. He woke up for a second time when the rest of the campground began to stir—adults who slept awful hours like 9:30 to 8:00. Not these teenagers, he thought, rolling over and burying his face in his pillow. He woke up for a third and final time not much later, when Tyler was beginning to stir. Tyler clearly didn’t want to be awake, judging by his groaning about the brightness and his thrashing in his sleeping bag. Josh didn’t want to disturb him by laughing, but Tyler was getting frustrated and it was pretty hilarious.

Eventually, having given up on trying to get any more restful sleep, Tyler rolled, like a log, directly into Josh’s arms and laid there, immobile. 

“So, are you stuck or is this on purpose?” Josh whispered, attempting to keep their conversation restricted within the thin walls of the tent. 

“On purpose, obviously,” Tyler mumbled sarcastically, voice muffled from the the sleeping bag completely entombing him. He stuck one hand out to wrap Josh’s arm around him and then hunkered down once again. “No homo, though,” he snickered. 

“Definitely. Wouldn’t want anyone to think we’re gay or anything,” Josh replied, squeezing the bundle of Tyler. 

“Yup. Just a couple of bros here, folks,” Tyler replied, rolling over so his face was less than an inch from Josh’s. Josh closed the gap without hesitation and his best bro Tyler didn’t seem to mind.

It was so easy kissing Tyler. It didn’t mean nothing, but it wasn’t difficult. There was no stress. It was so tempting to cup his face and pull him in all of the time. He wanted Tyler to kiss his lights out and while he could tell him that, he wasn’t going to. They’d been in the purgatory of relationships ever since Jenna dumped Tyler— long story short, she wasn’t really down to be one out of two of Tyler’s relationships, so they parted ways. 

Josh wasn’t sure enough to give a definite answer, and he sure as hell didn’t have the guts to ask. Deep down, Josh knew it was obvious that Tyler didn’t really have any more of a clue, but he was ignoring that. Because he didn’t need more; he was perfectly happy kissing Tyler until, God forbid, they got bored. On the other hand, if Tyler were to ask if he wanted to properly date him, it wasn’t like Josh was going to say no. 

A little while later, quiet voices and soft footsteps began to echo throughout the limited space of the campsite. There was an occasional clatter of silverware as people stirred their coffee. The birds were only getting louder, and Josh was pretty sure that people would notice their kissing noises not much later. 

As though it physically pained him, he pulled back and rubbed his eyes, blinded by light. He stretched his legs and listened to his bones cracking while his other limbs felt like TV static. And even though it was early, and his back was sore from nearly sleeping on the ground, the longer he was awake, the higher his mood climbed. 

Tyler sat up and pulled on a sweater. “Suit up. I don’t think it’ll be so warm once we’re out of our sleeping bags,” he warned. 

It didn’t look chilly out there to Josh, but he knew better than to disregard Tyler’s advise. He pulled on a jacket. It still smelled like smoke from last night’s campfire. Even his shoes, he noticed as he was pulling them on, still smelled of wood burning and crisp marshmallows. 

Tyler followed him out of the tent, toward the picnic table, where Ray and Patrick sat, quietly chatting and sipping coffee. They waved when they noticed Tyler and Josh approaching. 

“Sorry, did we wake you?” Patrick asked politely once everyone was settled at the table. He motioned at the kettle for Tyler, who was eyeing his cup of joe jealously. 

“Nah, if anyone’s to blame, it’s the birds,” Josh complained, rubbing his eyes raw. 

“You’ve got that right,” Ray scoffed while resting his weary head on the table. “That and those fuckers in site five who got up at five to chop wood. Fuckin’ hillbillies.”

“Did you walk all the way to site five just to figure out who to shame?” Tyler asked, pouring not one, but two cups of coffee. Josh smiled internally. 

“Damn right I did. I’m gonna shame them publicly the moment I get the chance,” he grumbled, drooling on the table.

“Did you not just mention that they’re hillbillies?” Patrick piped up. “Ray, I know we’re not the closest but I would be very sad indeed if you got murdered on Spencer’s Special Trip.” 

“So be it. I’m willing to die for the greater good. If shaming hillbillies does me in, then I’m gonna shame ‘em real good,” Ray mumbled. No one said another for a few moment while Ray fell asleep at the table. 

“Go get ‘em, Ray,” Josh snickered, accepting the cup of coffee being offered to him. Tyler sat on his lap the moment Josh set down the cup and this time Josh smiled for the whole world to see. Josh wrapped his arms around Tyler’s waist but quickly realized this was a very bad position for drinking coffee. 

Patrick was noticeably staring at the two of them. Josh understood. If he didn’t know shit about whether or not Tyler was his boyfriend, then all of his friends were probably only more confused. After the debacle of prom week last year, it had been pretty out in the open that they were more than friends, but that still left a lot of information unaccounted for. 

“So,” Patrick began, after working up his nerve for several awkward minutes. “What’s the deal with you two?”

“What d’you mean?” Tyler asked, sipping his coffee slowly. 

“Well… for starters, are you two dating?”

Tyler shrugged and looked at Josh, who shrugged back. “Undecided,” he said. 

“Oh. That’s cool. I--”

Ray muttered something about Truck Nuts in his sleep. 

Patrick tried to continue his thought but all together the three of them burst into muffled snickering before he could get it out. 

Meagan emerged from her tent looking tired but unabashedly happy. She was, without a doubt, wearing the weirdest combination of clothing Josh had ever seen, and he thought it was awesome. She wore an eye-mask on her forehead, an unzipped jacket over a sleeping shirt, sweats tucked into knee-high Deadpool socks, and Nike Slides. Meagan slid over to the table and poured herself a cup of coffee without a word. 

“Sleep well?” Patrick whispered, offering her a space next to him. 

“I slept like a baby. I haven’t slept that well since elementary school. No stress to keep me up, no loud noises, no street lamps… it’s so, so quiet out here.” She planted herself on the bench and ran a hand through her messy hair. 

“Not sure how quiet it was at site 18, but sure, quiet woods,” Patrick replied.

“Oh no,” Tyler hissed. “What happened? I barely remember a thing, I was so tired.”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Patrick replied, nose diving into his coffee to avoid anyone’s eyes. 

Josh was beginning to remember fragments of last night as well. The more he remembered, the less he wanted to think about it, so he shut it out before he got any really bad mental images. 

“So, what were we talking about before I woke up? I’m only asking because I don’t want anything to do with the current conversation,” Meagan interjected. 

“Patrick here was asking us about our love life.” Tyler didn’t try to hide the passive aggressive note in his voice. Josh slid him off of his lap. 

“You’re making it sound like he asked who fucks who,” Josh scolded light-heartedly. He held eye-contact with Tyler for a few seconds before he smiled and looked away. “He was just asking a question, and it’s not like it mattered to him because he knows more about dating a best-friend than anyone,” Josh mocked. 

Meagan snorted into her coffee.

Patrick went red in the face. “That never happened! Don’t make me tell you again.” Patrick paused for a moment. A little smirk appeared on his face. “Dating friends is one thing, but I’ve never dated a best friend, Josh.”

Alarms went off in Josh’s brain. He knew he shouldn’t ask, but he knew he was gonna anyway. “Interesting. Exactly which friend did you date, Patrick?” 

Even though he’d started the conversation, it was clear by the look on his face that that was not a question Patrick wanted to answer. “Your mom.” 

Josh flipped him off and downed the rest of his coffee. “Okay, I’m ready for breakfast. Who’s cooking?”

“I dunno what you’re expecting, but I think you’re deeply confused. The only breakfast we’ve got is what we bought yesterday. Unless you bought eggs and whatever--”

Josh stood up while she was openly doubting him and opened the bear box. Before Meagan could finish her sentence, he pulled out a carton of eggs. 

“Oh.”

“Mhm. So, who’s cooking?”

“NOSE GOES!” Tyler called, nearly punching himself in the nose. 

Since Ray was asleep and therefore couldn’t touch his nose, Meagan woke him and propped him up by the stove at the end of the table. She patted him on the back while he slowly awoke. 

“This is cruelty,” Patrick whispered, unpacking silverware from the cutlery box. 

“His own fault he didn’t touch his nose on time,” Tyler replied.

“HE WAS ASLEEP!” Patrick countered. 

“WAS IT RAY?” Josh hollered from across the camp site. Nobody was any longer concerned about keeping their voices low. 

“What?” Patrick asked.

“WAS IT RAY? WAS THAT WHO YOU--?

“JESUS CHRIST, NO!” Patrick rolled his eyes so hard Josh nearly got a headache just by watching. 

“Wait, this conversation is going too fast,” Ray mumbled, stirring butter around the heating pan. “Was I what? What about Patrick and I?”

“Nothing,” Patrick said quickly. 

“Oh, okay.” Ray went back to stirring butter and yawning. 

Breakfast was quiet but cheerful. Mostly, people were happy to have some energy in their systems, and be around each other. The five of them didn’t really have all that much in common with each other. Sure, Tyler and Josh were… well, Tyler and Josh, but aside from them, there wasn’t a whole lot of overlap. Ray hung out with Frank and Gerard and Mikey, and his girlfriend. Meagan chilled out with the gals and Pete, when they could stand each other. Patrick and Meagan knew each other, but that was sort of a weird relationship. Josh was pretty sure that Patrick hadn’t known about the fake-dating scam and was still bitter, since Pete was his best friend and didn’t clue him in. 

Even with the unlikely group bonding, the conversation soon returned to their other friends. 

“I wonder how everyone else doing,” Tyler whispered aimlessly. 

“Probably eating breakfast,” Meagan snorted. 

“Spencer’s currently serving a nice platter of forest berries and leeches that he collected,”  
Ray snickered. 

Meagan put her index fingers to her temples and shut her eyes in concentration. “Dallon’s enjoying it.”

“A little too much,” Patrick cut in.

“You’re all disgusting,” Tyler laughed.

Josh elbowed him and made a face. “Mmmm,” he hummed. “Tasty worms. Nothing like forest noodles at seven a.m.. A nice side platter of quail eggs.”

“Scrambled!” Meagan piped up.

Tyler laughed out loud and buried his face in his hands, shoulders shaking. “And Dal’ still hasn’t ever eaten a beet!” 

The whole table shuddered with laughter, fists slamming against the wood, knees being slapped, tears pricking the corners of eyes. 

“You know,” Patrick said, half crying with laughter, “I usually wouldn’t condone bullying of people who aren’t around to defend themselves, but this truly is a side of Spencer we’ve never seen before. I mean--” he snorted and covered his face in the crook of his elbow. “He’s like Mr. Barbie!”

“NOOOOO--”

“That’s illegal, you can’t say that!” Meagan cried. 

Poor Mr. Barbie, the outdoor ed teacher, was the brunt of so many memes between the students of East High. If only he knew, Josh thought. His jaw hurt from laughing so hard. He had to put his head down on the table and breathe, otherwise he was concerned he may suffer a stroke. He picked up his plate and cleared the table just to get away from the laugh attack.

“God,” he snickered. “If the whole week is gonna be like this, I won’t survive.”

“Guys, don’t yuck Spencer’s yum. If he likes worms and berries, then he likes worms and berries. He can’t control the fact that he’s a faerie,” Patrick explained. 

“He’s not the only faerie here. Have you met Ryan? And Hayley?” Ray added in. 

“Mother Nature is gay, I guess,” Meagan snickered, as if that wasn’t already obvious. 

“Oh, really? Is there something you can confirm about Hayley, since all of Mother Nature’s faeries are gay?” Tyler asked, eager for truth. 

“That was _such_ a reach, even for you, Tyler,” Meagan scoffed. “If you guys want to know whether Hayley’s a lesbian, why don’t you just ask?” 

“Being confrontational is not something we’re good at,” Patrick muttered, scraping his fork across his plate. He was avoiding her eyes. Everyone was. 

“Every second I become more confused about how you all managed to enter relationships. Pathetic,” Meagan snickered.

“Take it from me, neither do we,” Josh laughed, ruffling Tyler’s hair. (Because he could.) 

“No shit. I have a girlfriend so infinitely cooler than me that I feel blown away by her divine presence every time I see her, Josh and Tyler are so gay for each other that they don’t even know it, and Patrick? Patrick isn’t in a relationship for a reason,” Ray replied.

“Wow. Couldn’t have put it better myself,” snickered a undiscerned voice from behind Josh. Mildly offended, he turned around. But it was only Lindsey, so he couldn’t really get too mad at her. Behind her was a crew of a few others, all snickering animatedly. Included in the group was Spencer.

“Hey, Spencer! How were the bugs, man?” Ray called over. 

“Bugs? The… the bugs are great, I guess. Why? Seen any cool ones?” 

Ray was cringing so hard he was hard to look at. Tyler put his face down on the table and started laugh-crying. Meagan just shook her head and got up. 

“We’ve lost him,” she muttered, stalking over to her tent. “Hey, wait! Why are you here so early? It’s, like, seven. We’ve barely eaten.”

“It’s ten-thirty.”

Meagan looked up at the sky. “I don’t know how to read the sun.”

“...Great. Well, uh, we’re gonna grab that lake spot again before it gets too crowded, and then we’re gonna hitch up the kayaks. Aside from average, everyday badassery, that’s all I’m doing today,” Spencer shrugged. 

“Don’t leave Dallon out, Spencer. That’s rude,” Meagan said as she slipped into her tent. Dallon lit up like a flare. Spencer hucked a rock at the tent. An outraged scream rang out, but no angry Meagan remerged. 

“May I just say, uh, dibs on the kayaks,” Tyler inquired politely.

“You may,” Spencer replied. Dallon looked sorta upset, but he’d have to get over common courtesy. 

“I didn’t know you liked boats,” Josh said, not sure if it was a question or a statement. 

“I don’t know if I do. I’ve never kayaked before,” Tyler responded. “Come on, let’s get dressed. Unless you wanna kayak in the one pair of pajamas you packed.”

“Good plan.” Josh let Tyler drag him to the tent and ignored all the looks his friends were giving him. Deep down, he kinda liked it when Tyler was in control. 

“If you don’t know how to kayak, then why do you want to? You haven’t put effort into learning a new thing since you learned uke in seventh grade and decided that was the only skill you’d need for the rest of your life.” Josh pulled off both his sweater and his shirt while he spoke. 

“Is Spencer gone? Because he’ll never let me live if he hears me say this,” Tyler mumbled, peering out of the tent as best he could. Josh cocked a eyebrow. “I just wanted an excuse to spend time with you.”

“You’re my best friend, it’s not weird if we spend time together, just the two of us. It’s only weird with Brendon and Ryan, because yes, they’re best friends, but they’re also…”

“Brendon and Ryan.”

“Exactly.”

“True,” Tyler said. “But we’re kinda like Brendon and Ryan, if you think about it.”

Josh’s face started to heat up. Tyler was using his _I’m about to say something sappy_ voice that only came out once a millennia. 

“How so?” he asked.

“Well, we’re best friends. And I like you, and you like me, and we’re doing the do, and…”

“And?”

“--AND EVERYONE CAN HEAR YOU,” Meagan hollered. “SO IF THIS ISN’T SOMETHING YOU WANT EVERYONE TO HEAR, TYLER, SAVE IT FOR THE KAYAKS.”

Tyler flushed. “Thanks for the heads up, Meagan.” His voice was soft again. 

The two of them finished changing in silence. 

~

“You’re sure you don’t want a guide with you?” Spencer offered, holding the boat in place for Josh to step into. “Once you get to the other side of the lake, there’s some sloughs back there and it’s easy to get lost. Plus, it’s pretty hard to turn around.”

“I think we’ll be o––JESUS––” the boat lurched as Josh stepped in and he nearly fell face first into the water. He steadied himself and sunk down into the kayak. Spencer patted his shoulder and gave him a smile as though he never expected to see either of them alive again. “We’ll be fine,” Josh lied. 

“Mhm.” Spencer didn’t look convinced, but he did look a little amused, and Josh figured that the idea of their perils at sea was appealing enough, because Spencer handed him the paddle. Spencer waded back onto dry land and waved them off. “Have fun!”

Tyler, already in his boat, took off without a care in the world. Josh didn’t like how evil Spencer looked. He kinda felt like he was boating to his death. Reluctantly, he followed Tyler. 

And damn, it was worth it. As soon as they hit the channel and glided over the deep, blue water, peace was the only emotion available. He kinda wished he put on sunscreen before he left, but that was just semantics to him. He paddled a little stronger and caught up to Tyler. 

“Enjoying yourself?” Tyler asked, gazing up at the sky.

“More than you know,” Josh sighed.

“Don’t make me kinkshame you,” Tyler threatened, giggling. 

“That’s not what I meant and you know it, you sick bastard.” Tyler didn’t believe him but Josh didn’t expect anything less. 

“So, I know Spencer said the sloughs aren’t a good idea, but I really hate listening to him. I think we should go back there and check it out. Maybe we’ll catch a shark or something, who knows?” Tyler offered. 

“As long as we’re doing catch and release with said shark, I’m down,” Josh replied. 

“Hey, Josh.”

“Yeah?”

“Race you.” 

Josh didn’t have a chance to react before Tyler sped off in his shitty red kayak like Lightning fucking McQueen. He cursed under his breath and paddled like mad after the red blur speeding away from him. 

It killed both of them to admit it, but the sloughs were a challenge. They made it across the lake just fine, but their path grew narrow as the banks encroached until they found themselves in an overflown meadow, with reeds reached up taller than them. It felt like a corn maze. And they didn’t catch any sharks either, which was a major disappointment. They found a zillion ducks though, and got some mad seaweed stuck to their paddles. Tyler’s paddles nearly disappeared into the lake forever once or twice. And Josh didn’t have the best balance. 

He only flopped out of his boat once and he damn well didn’t want to do it again. The seaweed was nastier than any other feeling he could fathom. He was pretty sure there were frog eggs on it too. Tyler laughed when Josh fell out of the kayak, but Josh pushed him out as well, and then they were both stuck in the icky water with no way of getting back into their kayaks. Josh hadn’t really thought it through. Teenagers were impulsive like that, unfortunately. 

Tyler used some magical power (either spidey-sense or the Force, they couldn’t agree) to find a docking point. The sloughs really were beautiful, but the forest was too, and Josh got a little distracted. The pine needle covered ground wasn’t great on his bare feet, but he ignored it as he explored. There were some trails winding around the coast, but none of them were too trodden, and everything else about the place was pure wilderness.

“Josh, come on! I wanna fight some ducks!” Tyler complained.

“No, don’t fight the ducks! Fight the geese, those are the assholes. And I’ll be there in a second, I’m enjoying nature.”

“That’s exactly what Spencer wants you to do!” Tyler warned. 

_Damn_ , Josh thought. Tyler had a point. After one last look around, he climbed back into his kayak and jedassoned back out to sea. 

The sloughs were quiet and just like Tyler wanted, they had some alone time. It was unlike whatever Spencer thought they were doing, they just talked and joked like friends do, and shared some smiles here and there. It wasn’t too bad. 

But getting back was HELL. The wind was against them, and besides, their strength had been sapped on the journey in. It was only getting hotter as the day wore on, and it had to be nearly noon by the time the docks were in sight. Josh’s clothes weren’t drying at the same rate they were heating, so for most of the trip back, he was hot and moist, which, in this situation only, wasn’t a good thing. 

They were making good time once they crossed the midway point and regained some motivation. Up until they got a good look at the beach where their friends were camped out. Something was in the water with them, something big. 

“What in the fresh hell--” Tyler began. 

“Is that…” Josh squinted. “Tyler, now’s your chance to catch your shark!” 

“Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s a shark.” 

As they got closer, Josh agreed that whatever was in the water was not a shark. He signalled for Spencer to come help them out of the kayaks, and he met them at the dock. 

“How was it?”

“Wet.” Tyler looked like he regretted the words the moment he spoke them. 

“I bet it was,” Spencer snickered. 

Josh and Tyler left Spencer to tie up the kayaks because he kinda deserved it, in Josh’s opinion, and went to ask about the mysterious thing in the lake. Except, they didn’t need to ask, because as they approached, it became abundantly clear what was in the lake. 

Josh crouched down next to Dallon. “Whose air mattress is in the lake, and why?” 

“It’s Lindsey’s.”

Josh nearly shit himself. “Great! I think I’ll be leaving now!” He did a 180 but turned it into a 360 when he thought of another question. “Why? Why would someone risk their life like this? And who exactly... “ Josh was out of questions. 

Dallon laughed at his confusion. “It was a communal effort. But mostly Gerard and Ryan. They put it in the lake because it’s fun to have an air mattress in a lake, but also because now Lindsey and Hayley have to share a bed. Hayley has a queen mattress, so it’s not like they’re suffering.”

“All this so that we can have Hayley and Lindsey sleep together.”

“Yup,” Dallon took a sip of his water. “Kinda weird, if you ask me, but I want to know as badly as everyone else. And don’t even suggest asking them because you’re a coward too, Josh Dun.” 

Josh cracked a grin and hustled over to Gerard and Ryan, who were snickering with each other not too far away. 

“Okay, let me ask one question: why Lindsey’s mattress? I’d be more worried about her, and take Hayley’s instead.” Not that Josh would do that sort of thing, obviously. 

“I’m much more scared of someone nice getting angry at me than someone always angry getting slightly more aggravated at me,” Ryan replied coolly. 

“Dude, do you have any idea how mad Lindsey would get if we fucked with her lady like that? I don’t even care whether they’re dating or not, she’d murder each and every one of us and we’d never even hear her coming,” said Gerard. Gerard had a point, Josh decided, and let them be. 

“I know you were joking earlier,” said Tyler, as they made their way to the water’s edge, “but we might not survive this trip after all.”

“No shit,” Josh laughed, pulling his sweaty shirt over his head and flinging it somewhere behind him. “You coming in?”

“I’m okay, I think I’m gonna run back to camp and find my summer reading that I’m supposed to be doing.”

“Good luck with that.” Josh kissed him on the cheek before stepping into the icy water. He cursed so loudly he almost missed the new conversation behind him. Spencer was asking him about something. Josh couldn’t really be sure what about, but Tyler didn’t look too nervous when he, Spencer, and a few others all walked back to camp together.

It was a stark change from how it had originally been. Tyler had been Josh’s best friend since middle school, but he didn’t merge Tyler into his other friend group until high school, and to say the least, Tyler had been a little weird about it.

Josh’s friends were a lot to handle and Tyler was shy to begin with. He used to cling to Josh in situations like this, but now he seemed more confident. Josh wasn’t able to express how happy that made him.

He swam out to the mattress and climbed aboard, only to find himself in the midst of a mutiny. You see, what Dallon, Ryan, and Gerard had failed to mention, was that Lindsey already knew about the mattress, because she was _aboard it_. And she was brandishing a stick. 

“You three!” she was pointing her stick Brendon, Spencer, and Frank. None of them really had anything to do with the movement of her mattress, but it was fun to bully them anyway. “You three began a dangerous war today. I hope you know I won’t forget this. When you least expect it, I’ll strike, with blinding accuracy, and tear your happiness to shreds. Hear me?”

They nodded nervously. 

“AND YOU--” she whirled around to face Josh. 

“Me?” his voice came out squeaky. 

She awkwardly hobbled over to Josh and whispered in his ear. “Stand up. On my word, jump, and land as hard as you can.” 

Josh uncomfortably stood and attempted to retain his balance until Lindsey gave the signal. Now that he was thinking about it, he wasn’t sure what the signal was. 

“Lindsey, you know we didn’t move the mattress. That was Ryan and Gerard,” Frank pleaded. 

“Maybe so. But they’re not out here on my yacht, are they? No, it’s you three on the U.S.S. Ballato without captain’s permission, and it’s you three that are gonna wake up with poison oak in your sleeping bags.”

“It kinda ruins the surprise if you tell us what you’re gonna do,” Frank replied. 

Lindsey whacked him on the head with her stick and sent a look to Josh. “3...2...1!” the two of them launched into the air, and their combined force upon hitting the air mattress propelled the other three sailing into the air. They landed with three distinct splashes, and none of them sounded comfortable. Then Lindsey hit Josh in the back of the knee with her stick and he too went tumbling off the floatilla. 

Lindsey proclaimed the raft indebted to women only until further notice, so Josh swam back to shore. The air was warmer that day than it was yesterday, even though it was earlier in the day. Still, despite the increasing heat, Josh sat on the rocks in the sun in order to warm up. 

“Jesus fried chicken,” he mumbled. “Did anyone check the weather before we left service? Somebody tell me it’s going to warm up some more.” 

“It is warm, you’re just wet,” replied Gerard, still a dry as could be. Josh wasn’t sure he’d ever seen Gerard swim. He ignored the compulsion to point that out and moved on. Josh’s only real talent was his brain to voice filter. 

“Fine. But does anyone know if it’s gonna get warmer?”

“If it gets any warmer, we won’t want to hike anywhere,” Jon added. 

“Both of you are barred from talking to me. Did anybody check the fucking weather?” Josh complained. 

“Who is the weather fucking? Is it Mother Nature?” Hayley asked boredly. 

“Don’t do this, Hayley,” Josh warned. “I will--”

“It’s supposed to warm up, I think. The night before we left, Spencer muttered something in his sleep about bringing lots of sunscreen,” Dallon answered. He could have worded that only a little differently, and Josh would’ve actually paid attention to the important information. But Dallon said what he said, and now there were a fair few pairs of eyes latched onto him with curious and suggestive looks. 

“Oh, did he?” Pete asked, lowering his sunglasses. 

Dallon caught on pretty quick. 

“Did the two of you have a sleepover?” Cooed Pete, resting his head on his palms. He batted his eyelashes for emphasis. “Was there a little--JESUS CHRIST!” Pete grasped his forearm and stared.

“You good?” Josh asked.

“I think something bit me. Whatever. Back to bullying Dallon. As I was saying--” Pete’s face contorted like whatever had attacked him wasn’t so much of a “whatever”. “Holy shit that hurts. That actually stings like a motherfucker, fuck!” 

Mikey leaned forward to get a better look and swatted Pete’s prodding hand away while he examined. He took off his sunglasses and tried to hold Pete’s arm steady, but Pete was really pitching a fit now. As far as Josh knew from the stories of Pete’s assorted fights, he had a pretty high pain tolerance; from breaking his nose and going about a school day and _then_ going to the doctor, to the time he broke part of his finger with a hammer during art class. Josh figured that whatever happened to him must’ve hurt a whole damn lot, and his caring nature kicked in.

He stood up and crouched down next to the two of them. “Know what it was?”

“Not a clue. I bet Mr. Barbie--I mean Spencer would know,” Mikey snickered.

“Sounds good to me, let’s go,” Pete said, standing up quickly to avoid Josh noticing the tears in his eyes. Josh noticed anyway. 

“I have a first aid kit in my tent, I’ll go with you,” Josh offered, and he didn’t really let Pete say no. 

Josh didn’t really mind not wearing shoes, he liked being barefoot outside. Pete didn’t mind the sharp ground either, because it distracted him from the searing pain in his arm. Mikey, however, was a tenderfoot and nearly had to be carried. He was complaining more than Pete, and Pete was the one with a swollen arm. By some miracle, they made it back to site ten, but Spencer wasn’t there. Mikey stole some shoes.

Conveniently, Spencer was over at site fourteen, making sandwiches with Tyler and Patrick. Josh let Pete tell his story of woe himself, while he dug around his tent for the first aid kit. 

“What do you think it was?” Josh asked, handing Spencer the kit.

“If you’d let me examine it, maybe I could tell you!” Spencer snapped, trying to get a good look. Pete kept flinching and withdrawing his arm.

“Listen, Pete. If you’re a good boy--” Mikey began. 

“Nope, I am stopping you right there!” Patrick called out. “You’re not allowed to finish that sentence, Mikeyway.” 

“You don’t know what I was going to say!” he complained.

“Yes, unfortunately, I do.”

“MIKEY!” Tyler called out. Josh gave him a weird look, since Tyler wasn’t looking at Mikey. He was looking at Patrick. Then he clarified, “Was it Mikey?” 

“Will you drop it? I’m not telling you whether you get it right or not, so fuck off!” Patrick hissed, brandishing a ketchup-covered knife ominously. 

Apparently, Tyler’s journey, entitled “Who The Fuck Did Patrick Date” was ongoing. Josh ignored it and tried not to roll his eyes at his own boyfriend. Then again, Pete’s drama wasn’t much better. 

The bite ended up being from a horsefly. Spencer said they were common up in the mountains, since there were a lot of horse trails. And because flies are assholes. For his troubles, Pete earned a bandaid. It had Darth Vader on it. Mikey thought it was pretty cool, even if Pete was disappointed that he didn’t need to be airlifted out and taken into emergency surgery. 

The six of them ate sandwiches at the picnic table and brought the rest back to the lake for everyone else. It just so happened that when they returned, someone else had taken their places. “Someone else” came in the form of a truck hauling a small sailboat in the truck bed. Josh thought the truck seemed vaguely familiar.

“No way,” Patrick laughed, pushing past Josh to get to the truck. “NO WAY!” 

Even Pete “I need to be in the ICU” Wentz dropped his conversation and ran to the truck. Patrick banged his fists against the windows until the driver rolled them down. Whoever or whatever was in the passenger seat came flying out through the driver’s side window and bowled over Patrick. The landed on the ground with a couple of “oof” ’s. 

The truck driver flung open his door and Pete practically flew into the car after him. For a split second, Josh panicked, thinking everyone was fighting. He figured he’d missed something along the way. It hit him (like a truck) why everything seemed so familiar. 

Josh heaved a sigh of relief and helped Joe and Patrick off the ground, gave Joe a hug, and then went to make sure Pete hadn’t strangled Andy with one of his killer hugs. 

Josh was too stunned at the sudden arrival to be of much help in the sail boat unloading process, so he stood to the side and watched. Who invited Joe and Andy? They had graduated already, and had no moral reason to be hanging around with a gaggle of soon to be seniors. Ugh, Josh thought, they were gonna be seniors. He’d always thought that once you hit senior year, he’d have it all figured out, but… 

He watched Pete nearly get decapitated by the rudder. 

At least he wasn’t the only one unprepared to be an adult. 

~

“So, what brings you two to the great outdoors?” asked Spencer, stealing a bite of Dallon’s sandwich, even though he’d already eaten one on his own. 

“Pete and Patrick texted us almost simultaneously about some dipshit putting together a get-together, and we figured we could spice it up a little. ‘Cept, it seems like you’ve got that all figured out by yourself. Even if you’re only seniors,” Joe laughed. 

Spencer made a face at the word senior and handed the sandwich back to Dallon. “Sorry, Joe. I should’ve mentioned this right off the bat, but this is a school-free camping trip. Any worries, doubts, stressful ponderings, or upset auras receive a dunk in the lake. I don’t make-- actually, I do make the rules. Get in the water.”

“Not a problem. Andy’s shitty truck doesn’t have air conditioning,” Joe replied, peeling off his shirt and kicking off his shoes. Clad in shorts, socks, and sunglasses, Joe and ran and jumped into the water. 

“You too,” Spencer said to Andy, who was looking too unconcerned to be left alone. 

“Why me? I didn’t even say anything!” 

“Conspiracy by relation. Lindsey, gimmie the stick.” Lindsey tossed him her stick and he pointed it at Andy. “Water, now.” Reluctantly, Andy pulled off all his clothes except for his shorts and dove off the rock into the water. 

“And let me just make one thing clear!” Spencer said, turning to face his semicircle of friends. “That goes for all of us, okay? This trip is to be East High free! No college essays, no letters of recommendation, no--” Spencer saw Tyler doing his summer reading innocently. He grabbed the book and dropped it into the shallows. “--NO SUMMER READING!” But he obviously felt bad and picked it back up and set it down to dry out. 

“Everyone got it?” he asked. People were trying to hold back their laughter but nodded along to Spencer’s insanity. He nodded in finality. Lindsey took back her stick. 

“Is there a time limit?” Andy asked, peeking out of the shallows like a swamp monster. 

“...No,” Spencer thought aloud. “But you do have to be completely saturated. There, that’s the rule now. Complete saturation or obliteration.”

Andy stared at Spencer, like he was some weird little kid spewing nonsense. Josh snorted. That wasn’t too inaccurate. 

“Anybody wanna try out the boat then?” Andy asked, stepping out of the lake and wiping the water off of his upper body. “My folks only bought it, like, a week ago and it’s practically brand new. It was like five-hundred bucks off Ebay.”

Josh elbowed Tyler with a “?” expression. 

“I think I’ve exhausted all of my boating energy today,” he revealed. Josh was sorta relieved. He’d nearly drowned enough that day, he didn’t want to risk it another time. 

“Do you even know how to rig it?” Patrick asked.

“Sure. Can’t be too hard.”

It could, as it turned out. 

The boat sailed straight into the channel and _immediately_ started turning in circles. The sail kept flapping back and forth and whacking Andy in the back of the head. Pete kept trying to sit on the prow but the boat kept listing forward whenever he shifted his weight. It was not smooth sailing. 

Lindsey bet Gerard ten bucks that she could go faster on her air mattress boat. With the help of a kayak paddle and a good push, she could. Andy flipped her off as she floated past, gloating all the while. The Lindsey tried to stand up on her raft and jump onto the other boat, failed, and Spencer had to get the kayak to tow her back in. Except she didn’t appreciate being rescued and capsized Spencer as well, shouting, 

“I AM THE GODDESS OF THIS LAKE!” and splashing madly. 

Dallon was altogether too unconcerned to go get his drowning boyfriend and continued lounging in the sun. 

“So,” Tyler said, pulling Josh out of his reality-show of a friend group. “Do I have to make up another hobby to spend time with you, or would you rather bear witness to the murder of your Spencer?”

“You know?” Josh laughed. “I think you’re a bit better company.”

~

Nobody gave them any shit for leaving, as Josh had predicted, but once they were alone, they ran into a problem. 

“So, what do you wanna do?” Josh asked, stuffing his hands in his pockets even though it was, like, a billion degrees outside. “Pete said he saw a bear yesterday. I don’t really want to get eaten by a bear.”

“Not into vore?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Josh spat playfully. 

“Yeah, I’ve gotta know if you’re into vore before I ask you out,” Tyler laughed.

“If you ever ask me out.”

“Ha! We’ll see,” he teased, pausing at the fork in the road. “Left or right?”

Josh repressed his disappointment about the conversation not continuing. “Where do the roads lead? Hopefully not into a bear den.”

“That’s site five, dude,” Tyler snorted. “But for real, our options are redneck side of the campground or the loop that will eventually take us back to our site. Very exciting, I know.”

“I don’t know if Ray committed his public redneck shaming yet, but if he did, I’d rather stay on this side of the camp, thanks,” Josh replied.

“Coward.”

“Hey, maybe I’m just trying to lure you back to our tent, you don’t know!” Josh contested. 

Tyler turned to him with his dark eyes glittering. “You could have just said that in the first place.”

“Didn’t want you to think I was gay, bro.”

Tyler pursed his lips in an attempt not to laugh, and turned down the camp loop path. Josh silently thanked all the nature behind him and caught up to Tyler. They walked in silence for a while, enjoying nature’s quiet and the scuffle of their shoes against the old cement underfoot. Finally, Tyler said,

“God, it’s so nice to be alone.”

Josh stared at him. “I guess I’ll go fuck myself then.”

“No,” Tyler laughed, as if there was something very obvious Josh just wasn’t getting. “You’re part of my alone time. Being around you is just as relaxing as being completely alone. If I’m overstimulated, I can always find you, ‘cause you’re just as good.”

“Tyler…” Josh stopped in his tracks. His heart was beating way too fast.

Tyler, wondering why Josh was being so dramatic, glanced back at Josh. “...Yeah?”

Just like that, his nerve was gone. It wasn’t a big deal, he told himself. Just ask him. ASK HIM! He just couldn’t. “That was awfully… homoerotic, Tyler. You’re not gay, are you?” 

Tyler clasped a hand to his mouth in mock surprise. “Bro, it’s not like that! I was just bro-ing out with you, bro!”

Josh forced a voice crack. “Bro.”

They both doubled over into a fit of laughter, snickering and snorting. Wheezing and wobbling, they kept moving along the road. So close, Josh told himself. Maybe another time. 

The road curved to the right and before long they re-entered the campground. The road ahead kept going until it passed by site fourteen, but something else caught Josh’s eye. Site nineteen, the very farthest site, was unoccupied for the night. Spencer had said it was the best site for illicit activities because it was basically borderless. Past a few flat tent spots, a picnic table, a bear box, and a grill, there was nothing but forest and giant fucking boulders. 

“Wanna go cli--”

“Yes.” Tyler took off toward the campsite. Josh lost him in an instant. 

When he found him, Tyler was on top of a boulder, using it like a stepping-block to climb onto a taller tree. Josh watched in awe. “You’re gonna fucking kill yourself.”

“Very possible.”

“I meant by climbing so high,” Josh clarified. 

Tyler paused and looked down at him. “I know that.”

Josh shrugged and climbed up after him. It was tougher than Tyler made it look; he couldn’t find enough footholds and kept skinning his palms on the granite. Still, with patience, he made it onto the rock. Tyler was already halfway up the tree and Josh didn’t feel like falling to his death today. 

“I’ll just stay down here,” Josh laughed. He settled down and spread his legs out in front of him. There was a hill in front of him that led all the way down to the road, covered in moss and logs midway through decay. Fungi dotted the space underneath trees like sprinkles. Something large and hard dropped from the tree above and bonked Josh on head. 

It was not a pine cone, as he’d originally thought. It was Tyler’s summer reading. 

“Where were you carrying this?” Josh laughed, setting it in the sun to dry some more. 

“You don’t need to know.”

Josh scooted away from the book and layed back. The sun was slightly reddened by lingering smoke in the air, and the orange light cast a faint glow on his skin. He shut his eyes to avoid worrying about how high Tyler was climbing, and when he opened them, Tyler was laying by him.

“I didn’t notice the smoke down by the lake. It’s so weird,” said Tyler. He picked up his book and tried to flip through the damp pages. 

“I’m trying not to think about it. I’m afraid that I’ll burn to death in my sleep.”

“Ugh, I know,” Tyler mocked. “So much life left to live!”

Josh shoved him playfully. “Just because you don’t have any regard for your own life doesn’t mean others don’t care about themselves!” Josh paused. “Or about you.”

Tyler scooter closer and put his head on Josh’s shoulder. He opened his mouth but his mind was blank. “I just…” Tyler sighed. “Thanks.”

Josh ran his hands through Tyler hair and played with it while they unwound. As many unspoken things as there were to say, not one was uttered in the time they spent there. Josh could find the words, probably, if he really wanted to, but why ruin a perfectly good moment with shitty stuff, like emotions? Nobody needed those. 

He probably would’ve sat there all afternoon with Tyler if somebody hadn’t started a search party for them. Whoever was looking definitely would not have found them, so Josh and Tyler slipped down from the rock and went to them. 

“There you are! I was looking for you,” Meagan said.

“We know. We could hear you yelling,” Tyler snickered. “We were all the way back there, though.”

“I’ve been told I’m loud,” she reminisced. “Anyway, I was the designated searcher because we’re packing up by the lake and gonna to make dinner soon. I figured you wouldn’t want to miss that.”

“Solid reasoning,” Josh agreed. 

The three of them walked back toward the camp. About three feet in, Tyler asked if Josh would carry him, and because Josh is a fool in love, he said yes. Tyler hopped onto his back and with a grunt, Josh kept on walking. Meagan watched them with enthusiasm.

“Pete was never that nice to me,” she complained light-heartedly.

“You are Pete weren’t actually dating though,” Josh said, squinting at her in confusion.

“I know. You’d think I would’ve tried to see what I could get away with, but no. I don’t think he would’ve done anything like that anyway, Mikey was the one trying to make it seem believable. Ah, good times.”

They couldn’t help but laugh. 

“That was so funny when the word first got out,” Tyler said, laughing. “Mikey was so mad, and you-- you just typed out this _magnificent_ expository paragraph over Skype and I don’t think I’ve ever laughed that hard in my life!”

“I know, I know. But sometimes I regret that I said all that because, who knows? Maybe if I hadn’t explained everything we wouldn’t be stuck with the world’s most annoying couple,” Meagan whined, despite still laughing.

“Hey, no discrimination. Everyone here is equally annoying, single or otherwise,” Josh put in. 

“I agree for the most part, but name one annoying thing that Tyler has ever done,” said Meagan.

“Me,” replied Josh, automatically. Meagan took that for an answer, and Josh took offence to that. Tyler whacked him on the chest just hard enough for it to be painful. 

They arrived at their site and Meagan disappeared into her tent. Josh stared down the empty road to the lake while Tyler jogged down the little hill into their camp.

“Aren’t you coming?” he asked.

“I kinda wanna go swimming again, before dinner. Since everyone’s packing up, it would just be me... and you, if you wanted to tag along.” Josh looked up at the reddening sky. “It’ll be sunset soon, it’ll be really pretty.”

Tyler walked toward him and touched his hands. “I would, but--”

Josh looked crestfallen. He waited for Tyler to talk about being worried that someone would make fun of them or something, since Tyler apparently only worried about shit like that. 

“--I have to help make dinner tonight. Go if you want to, though,” he finished. 

Josh put on a smile. “Hmm… I don’t know if it’s worth it to put off cooking for another night. Hayley’s gonna get me in my sleep eventually. Then again, I think I have sap stuck on me from sitting under that tree for so long, and it’ll bug me if it doesn’t come off. I guess I’ll go. I’m more scared of tree sap than Hayley. Psychoanalyze that,” Josh remarked. 

Meagan walked up behind Tyler. “I’ve got everything for the dinner making process, boys. It’s at fourteen tonight. Ready to go?”

“Nah, Josh is gonna beat the fuck outta some trees at the lake,” said Tyler. Josh preferred to speak for himself, but Tyler got it pretty much on the nose. 

“Oh, okay. Have fun with that. You punch those trees real good, Josh. See ya!” Meagan nodded encouragingly, punching him lightly on the arm. Tyler kissed him goodbye and then walked with Meagan toward site fourteen. 

Josh felt goofy, staring at him as he walked away. He couldn’t take his eyes off of him until he rounded the corner and disappeared from sight. He came to like water was poured on him. He jolted and walked quickly toward his tent. With a thud he collapsed on his bed. He knew he was supposed to look for a towel so he could go to the lake like he said he wanted to, but his bed felt really comfortable. And then he got to thinking.

Something was happening to him. He thought about all the times he’d nearly asked Tyler out that day alone, and wondered why he couldn’t make himself do it. That thing Tyler had said about Josh being his “alone time” felt like a proclamation of love, but Josh didn’t want to get ahead of himself. He smiled into his sleeping back and sighed. The longer he spent with Tyler, the harder it was to watch him go. 

He sat up and laughed at how lame he was, not able to cope in any other way. Then he grabbed his towel from his stuff sack and climbed back out of the tent. For once, the site was empty. The quiet came in the form of silent winds and the far off sound of leaves blustering around on tree branches. He took a deep breath of smoke-tinged air and left camp. 

He needed to clear his head. A nice swim ought to do some good, he thought to himself as he strolled down the road. He noticed Pete and Mikey walking toward him and he waved. Mikey waved back but Pete seemed too preoccupied with something. As Josh came closer, he noticed the dreary expression Pete wore, and as he passed them, he picked up a few fragments of their conversation.

“--It’ll be okay, and you can always go home early if you want to--”

Josh sent a nervous glance over his shoulder, but neither Pete nor Mikey stopped, so he kept moving. Pete’s horsefly bite couldn’t have been that severe, right? Josh had never been bitten by one, so he had no data, but he didn’t imagine it would be that painful. He hoped Pete would be okay.

The lake was glowing pink, reflecting the sunset overhead. It was cooler now and the flying insects flew around, waiting to be eaten by trout, but it was perfect to Josh. He draped his towel over a rock and completely undressed right then and there. So what if anyone saw? Josh imagined Smokey the Bear showing up at his site tomorrow and issuing him a citation for public nudity. Whatever, if he scarred the fish, that was their fault. 

He hopped into the water, significantly less warm than it had been earlier, yet still residually warm, and dove under the gently lapping waves. He soon discovered that he couldn’t think about his relationship drama and avoid being consumed by Jaws, so he dunked one last time and got out. If he’d been cold earlier, then he was hypothermic this time. He huddled behind a tree and dried off as quickly as possible. The layers he’d been wearing weren’t warm, but at least he wasn’t so exposed anymore.

He ruffled his wet hair with the towel and thought about walking to site eighteen to help with dinner. But if he went, Tyler would be there and… yeah, he could procrastinate a little while longer. But again he ran into the problem of where to go. He felt so lost in the great outdoors, that the only thing he could do was retrace his steps. He walked up the hill toward the fork in the road, and took the same path he’d taken earlier, with Tyler. Finally, he got to thinking.

He once again ended up by site nineteen, only this time he hadn’t meant to chase Tyler. He was passing by and looking in, only to find Tyler sitting on the same rock they had lain upon in the afternoon. _Okay_ , Josh told himself. _Just… go over to him. Talk. Say the things. Make the words… happen. Great. Make the words happen. That’ll do it, for sure._

He rolled his eyes at himself and trudged into the campsite. 

Tyler didn’t notice him until he was less than a meter away. “What are you doing here?” he asked, not looking at Josh.

“I was gonna ask you that. I thought you were supposed to be making dinner.”

“I forgot my book, so I came back,” he replied, flashing the yellow cover of his summer reading at Josh. The pages still looked damp. 

“Oh. Well, it’s a good thing I found you, since I wanted to talk to you about something.” Josh was well aware how nerve-wracking those words sounded, but he couldn’t reword them now, much less take them back. 

“Okay.” Tyler’s voice was quiet. And he still wasn’t looking at Josh, which meant something, obviously, but Josh hadn’t a clue what. 

“I’ve been thinking a lot today, about you mostly, not gonna lie. And um…” Josh scratched the back of his head. He felt so awkward, staring up at Tyler. “This might sound terrible to you, and that’s okay, totally okay! But, uh, I was considering maybe…” His heart was racing and he felt like every sentence he came up with sounded bad. 

Tyler finally turned his head and all of the air in Josh’s lungs left him. Without knowing how, he managed a, “would you date me?”

“Oh, yeah, for sure. I totally _would_.”

Josh let out the breath frozen in his lungs and rolled his eyes. “Building off of that, will you date me?”

Tyler swung his legs around so that Josh was perfectly in between them. Then he cupped Josh’s face and pulled him in. Josh had never felt a rush of emotions so intense. All of the missing parts of him seemed to be found. His heart, light and airy for the first time all day, beat unapologetically from within his chest; he was sure Tyler could hear it. His breath came in bursts whenever he could fit it in. Tyler’s lips were on his and he didn’t dare risk losing that until he came within an inch of suffocation. Even then, he released Tyler gently and kept their faces close together. 

“So is that a yes or a no?” he asked, smiling gently.

“A hard yes,” Tyler laughed, leaning back in. 

Josh snorted. “I can help with that.”

“And they say chivalry is dead.”

Josh helped Tyler down from the rock, not that he needed it, and for a moment they stood so close that Tyler really could feel Josh’s heartbeat. 

“So are we gonna…? Or…” Tyler began, biting his nails. 

“Do you really wanna fit that inaccurate horny teenager stereotype that perpetuates the stigma that teens are sexually mature?” Josh asked, a note of satire in his voice.

“It’s not a stereotype if I am actively thinking about sucking your dick right now,” Tyler replied, shrugging. 

“You got me there,” Josh responded, backing up against the rock as Tyler undid his belt. This really wasn’t what he was expecting, but he was down for it, and he wasn’t gonna deny himself the opportunity to get not one, but TWO public nudity citations. 

~

By the time they had “finished their business”, dinner was almost ready to be eaten, and Hayley was waiting by the grill to give them hell. 

Since they disappeared and left her with the actual inhabitants of site eighteen, she decided it was her God given right to smite them on spot. “LOOK WHO DECIDED TO SHOW UP!” She marched over to them and grabbed Tyler by the recently washed hand. Tyler grabbed Josh and Hayley pulled both of them to the picnic table and demanded they set it immediately. 

“You two are gonna make dinner tomorrow night, with Joe and Andy. They brought a truck full of meat, and the both of you are on grilling duty.”

“They failed to mention that earlier,” Josh pointed out, picking up the tongs and flipping over a burger. 

“They did, but you and Tyler were off doing strange fuck-buddy things, so it’s not my fault you didn’t hear them.”

Josh silently flipped another burger, having no words to retaliate. Tyler suppressed a laugh and joined Josh by the grill. 

“Hell-ly,” he muttered, slipping his hand into Josh’s back pocket. Josh opened his mouth to reminds Tyler he’d already made that joke before, but a commotion broke out behind them.

“EVERYONE!” shouted Spencer. “Today was a nice, lazy day but I believe I’m getting…” he paused for dramatic effect. “Cabin fever.” Everyone groaned in agony. “Tomorrow I want to go on a hike to this really cool place called Emerald Pools. It’s only a mile away and there’s tons of tiny little waterfalls and stuff like that. And bees! Don’t forget everyone’s favourite animals, bees.”

“Bees can eat shit!” Pete called out.

“You got stung by a HORSEFLY, asshole! The bees did NOTHING WRONG!” Frank shouted.

Pete cupped his face in his hands. “Vegetarians.”

Josh looked down at his burgers. “Hayley, I think these are done!” 

She wandered over and sniffed the grill. “You’re relieved of your short-lived duties. See you this time tomorrow so Joe and Andy can grill _you_.”

“Sounds hot, I’m down,” said Tyler, picking up a tomato from the picnic table and eating it. 

Hayley looked exasperated. “You two are ridiculous as individuals, I don’t know what I’d do if you two were actually dating.”

Tyler and Josh looked at each other with glorious irony. Hayley caught on.

“Never mind,” she said, walking away. “Go set the table!” 

Tyler left in search of utensils, but Josh sought better ideas. “Why don’t we just eat around the fire? We can’t fit all of us at the table anyway, so let’s just pull up a couple of extra chairs and eat there.”

“You’re a lazy bastard and I hate you,” Hayley muttered. “But fine, I don’t disagree with your point.”

Josh could tell she was… a little stressed. Using his surplus of good attitude, he decided to help her out. “Come on, Hayley,” he sighed, gently pulling her over to the campfire. “Sit down. We’ll handle this. Just chill out a little and eat some over-cooked burgers, maybe have some fun.” Tyler appeared at her side with a nicely dressed burger and handed it over. 

She looked down at it. “Borger.”

“There you go,” Josh encouraged, petting her on the head while she began to eat. He turned to the rest of the site and proclaimed, “FOOD’S UP!” 

Hayley was too engrossed in her burger to scold the mad rush made for the grill. After all the food had been scrapped off the grill, Josh transferred the coals into the fire pit. A campfire was roaring in no time, thanks to the help of a little kindling. Josh was pleasantly surprised that the food was actually good and before long, it was all gone. Paper plates got thrown in the fire and the meat juice made the flames crackle and pop like Rice Crispies. 

As the few people who sat at the picnic table for dinner finished, Patrick was once again sent back to the other sites to grab more chairs. Luckily this time Joe and Andy offered to go with him, because they were nice people. Josh wasn’t ashamed to admit that he and his friends weren’t “good people” most of the time. 

“I wonder if it was one of them,” Tyler whispered.

“One of who? What?” Josh tried to understand what had been going on while he was zoned out. 

“Joe or Andy. D’you think Patrick dated one of them?”

“Oh my God, you’re nuts,” Josh laughed, burying his face in his hands. Like aforementioned, they weren’t “good people” most of the time. “Why do you really want to know? Don’t tell me you have a bet with anybody.”

“Nah, everyone here knows everyone else way better than I do, there’s no way I’d through my very little amount of money around like that.” Tyler did tend to have very distanced relationships with all his friends. 

“Mood, but why then?”

“Because.”

“Because why?”

“Because I wanted to know if he still has a good relationship with that person, because obviously it didn’t work out but if they’re still friends that’s good because we’re kinda in something like that and I don’t know what I’d do with myself if we ever… lost touch.”

“And… you don’t want to just take his word that he’s still friends with this person?” Josh suggested, hiding how truly touched he was. 

“God, no,” Tyler scoffed, also throwing away his anxious undertones. “Since when have I ever believed anything anyone has ever said?”

Josh choked on water and he laughed into his lap. Tyler let out a howl of laughter and suddenly it was silent around the fire, except for Josh’s wheezing and Tyler’s maniacal laughter. Josh used all of his will power to keep the water in his mouth and not all over his lap and the campfire.Tyler slid so far down his chair that the chair itself slipped and Tyler landed on his back in the dirt. Josh got up and ran a few feet before spitting the water everywhere, laughing uncontrollably. He nearly hacked up a lung. 

“Anyway,” said Brendon loudly, once everyone had settled back down. “Where was I? Oh yeah, the power vacuum. Anyway, so the long story short, the U.S. entered the war in Iraq too early and fucked all the shit up and then left the war too soon, creating a power vacuum in the middle east, which led to Taliban control and the eventual Twin Tower bombing. Essentially, yes, Bush did 9/11.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, what did we walk in on,” Tyler spluttered. 

“Did you just prove that Bush did 9/11 with FACTS?” Frank hissed, staring wide-eyed at Brendon. 

“Yeah, I think he did,” replied Gerard, equally mystified and ashamed for being so. 

“Yes, I did,” agreed Brendon. “I’ve thought about it a lot. Plus, my cousin took a course on it in college and learned just about the same thing, just in case you think I’m spouting complete and utter bullshit.”

“What have you ever said that would make us believe otherwise?” laughed Ryan playfully. His eyes were dark and reflecting the firelight, and ew, Josh knew _that_ look. 

Brendon glared at him and crossed his arms. “Remember on our midterm when you asked for answers from me?”

“Yeah, and we both got it wrong,” Ryan responded.

“Well I got it more right than you.”

“Ooooooh, I like this game,” chimed Spencer, rubbing his hands together, and looking more like Mr. Barbie, hand-rubber extraordinaire, by the second. “The _tell awful Brendon stories_ game.”

There were glorious amounts of excited rumbling, as though everyone had at least one story to contribute, if not more. Someone turned the music volume up to cover the nefarious things being said at the shame circle. Joe and Andy showed up just as things were getting good, carrying paper bags of “craft brews” which beat PBR any day. The party got going. 

“How can you all forget that summer at band camp, going into sophomore year? Brendon caught a fish in the lake and decided to “slow-cook it”,” Spencer used finger quotes, “by leaving in the hot sun on the porch of his cabin? That shit was RANK for days!” He grimaced like he could still smell it in his nose. 

Brendon also looked quite pained at that memory. He pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to become one with the chair. Ryan patted his shoulder mockingly. God only knew what Ryan had to have endured over the years. Now that he thought about it, Josh kinda wanted to know.

“Ryan, you’ve been averagely quiet, but I feel like we could use some dirt from you,” he piped up.

“No way. There’s too much. I’d probably kill him.”

“Now we have to know!” Dallon complained. 

Ryan sent him the evil eye, and Josh needed to know what that look meant. See, there wasn’t much “under the table” dirt with his group of friends, most of it was out in the open, over Skype, the moment it happened, but sometimes there were things… left out. Josh wasn’t really in the know, so when the tea spilling began, he was all in. 

“Well, let’s see,” Ryan sighed, like an old man about to help a protagonist out on his or her quest. “I know that there’s a failed relationship between Bren and Dallon, I know that Brendon was the one who dumped lube all over me last year, and that I’m gonna get him back for that when he least expects it, I know about the leather bound book on Brendon’s book shelf that houses fan fiction he wrote about Minecraft Youtubers, I know that the real reason he broke his hand in seventh grade was because he pretended to fist a piece of PVC piping and the hole wasn’t big enough for his hand, so he just punched it really hard and shattered his knuckle, I know about the time that he was thirsting after Brent’s older sister and she shot him with a nerf gun and his bit her and then her mom yelled at both of them in front of the whole household like a public hanging--”

“Okay, I think that’s enough, thanks!” Brendon cut in, putting a hand over Ryan’s mouth. “What happened to sparing me?!”

Ryan was laughing too now. “Do you really deserve it? You dumped a bucket of--”

“YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE TO LET THAT GO EVENTUALLY!”

Howls of laughter reverberated through the camp. Quiet time didn’t go into effect until ten, so they had plenty of time to fuck around and be loud. Even though site seventeen had a young child, who was apparently named Hudson, and kept getting yelled at for doing dumb shit. By nine-thirty, the gang was showing no signs of quieting down, let alone stopping. 

“Guys, look!” whisper-shouted Pete. There was someone approaching their site from the road. “It’s a bear!” He hopped up and ran to meet the person, who, judging by their walk, wasn’t there to socialize. 

The group watched Pete straighten up and nod, eventually shaking the “bear”’s hand and returning to the firelight.

“How was the bear?” Mikey asked jokingly. 

“He told us he could hear us at site five,” Pete said quietly. 

Laughter exploded into the inky black night sky. 

“So it was the bear!” Patrick exclaimed, cheeks bright red from laughter. 

“Yes! But he still told us politely to shut up, so that sucks. I dunno about you guys, but he’s pretty tall up close, and I’d listen to him.”

Frank wolf whistled. “Dare I say you’re intimidated by the big, scary bear man?”

“You shut your fat mouth, Iero,” Pete laughed, pointing an accusatory finger at Frank. “He’s a whole three feet taller than me, so he’s gotta be at least three times your height.”

“Boys, boys,” Brendon intervened. “Let’s not start a measuring contest.”

Pete perked up like an idea has struck him. “Oh! I’m sure that’s also something Ryan could tell us! Ryan, doth thou happen to knoweth thy size of--”

“I’m gonna stop you there,” Mikey interjected, laughing, but nervous that Ryan would actually respond. Unfortunately, what he got was worse.

“Pete, as one of my dearest friends, and having seen your dick, may I just say, it’s bigger than yours,” replied Ryan coolly. 

A chorus of “OOOOOH”’s went up and nearly woke up the entire campground, and it was at that point that Spencer became cautiously aware that the ranger’s may have heard that. He raised his hands for silence, but he couldn’t keep that straight of a face. He kept laughing every time he tried to say something serious. Finally, his words returned to him.

“Children, please. Let’s just… take a few seconds to cool off before we return to the regularly scheduled banter, okay? Just a few seconds of quiet. Enjoy the nature sounds.”

“Yes, Mr. Barbie,” whispered _way_ too many people in unison. After a brief burst of laughter, there was quiet. Until Hudson had to fuck all the shit up again. 

“HUDSON, GET IN THE TENT. NO, YOU MAY NOT HIT YOUR SISTER WITH A STICK, GET-- HUDSON--”

There was a beat of silence where everyone was holding it in as best they could. Then there was a whack like a bat against a piñata, followed by,

“HUDSON I TOLD YOU NO, DAMMIT!”

And the camp descended into chaos. 

~

After ten o’clock arrived, they shut of their loud music and a few people went to bed, but the party still simmered. Joe and Andy tucked away the rest of the Craft Brews for the next night and went off to put the cooler back in their bear box. 

The night wore on, and even though he was having the time of his life, Josh began to feel a little weary. Even ringmaster Spencer was yawning and staring into the fire. 

“Man,” he whispered. “I am so gonna miss this place. It’s never gonna be the same after this trip. I’m gonna keep coming back with the fam, but… you know.”

_Yeah_ , Josh agreed. But something was a’ stirring. It took him a moment to catch on. People were looking around now, sitting up straight. Wondering if what Spencer said qualified him for…

“Oh, dearest Spencer,” Brendon sighed, rubbing his eyes. “I’m so sorry to have to do this to you, but what you just said… as sentimental as it was…” He pursed his lips like he was deeply troubled by what he had to say. “I think it violated some agreements.”

Spencer, confused and dazed, stared uncomprehendingly. Then suddenly, “No. No, Brendon. No it does not. I--” Spencer got up out of his chair and tried to run, but Brendon was faster. 

“ONWARDS, BROTHERS, SISTERS, AND EVERYONE IN BETWEEN! WE MUST HONOR THE SACRED OATH AND DEAL OUR FRIEND A DIP IN THE LAKE!” 

A cheer arose and the whole party, suddenly awake and alert, rose to their feet and wrestled Spencer toward the lake. Tyler made Josh stay behind for a moment. 

“This is my moment,” he explained. “Do you think if I tell Patrick that we’re dating he’ll tell me who he dated?”

“That sounds sorta manipulative, Ty.”

“I mean, yeah, but I’ve gotta know! And then I’ll never bug him again.”

Josh sighed. “Sure, go ahead. I’ll wait.”

Patrick was apparently the only one too tired to accost Spencer and dunk him in the lake, and he lingered behind, finishing up his drink by the fire. Josh waited by the bathrooms while Tyler ran back down to the camp, nearly scared Patrick shitless, and talked for a few moments. Josh was surprised to see Tyler give him a hug and then jog back over to Josh. They started walking to catch up with the drown Spencer posse.

“So, did he tell you?”

“Yep.”

“Cool. Who was it, Tyler? Who’d he date? You finally have your answer. How’s that feel?” Josh mimicked a reporter holding a microphone and held it up for Tyler to speak into.

Tyler cleared his throat and leaned into it. “Wouldn’t you like to know, weather boy?” He bolted off. 

“HEY!” Josh complained. “YOU’RE NOT GONNA TELL ME?”

“ASK HIM YOURSELF!” Tyler called back. 

Josh rolled his eyes at God herself and sadly jogged down the road after Tyler. 

~

Spencer was successfully dunked, but afterwards he didn’t return to the fire. In fact, it seemed a lot of people were getting tired and went straight to their tents. Josh contemplated this, but after so much gossip already revealed, he didn’t want to risk missing any last bits. 

It turned out, there weren’t any. Meagan started playing weird stoner music that wasn’t fun at all, and Josh didn’t understand why people listened to music that wasn’t fun. Some of the site eighteen residents retired to the sack and Josh just felt like a voyeur at that point. Then Tyler ran off and after ten whole minutes Josh decided to go after him.

He said goodnight and started to walk away, but stopped. He turned to address his friends. “Boyfriends, right?” he scoffed jokingly. Then he turned away again and left his friends to unpack that. He checked the bathroom, but Tyler wasn’t there, so he kept going down the road. There weren’t any street lamps and it was creepy as shit, but it wasn’t dark. 

The moon overhead was so bright that Josh didn’t even need to use his flashlight or headlamp. He watched the stars overhead as he walked and consequently, he walked right into something. Both somethings screamed into the night. 

“Jesus Christ!” Tyler panted. “I thought you were the Crunch!”

“The what?” 

“The Crunch! Didn’t you hear that weird stomping coming from back here?”

“Yeah, but I figured it was just a deer of some shit,” Josh admitted.

“Nah, man. It sounded human, or at least bipedal.”

It was too late and they were too isolated for Tyler to start talking about conspiracy theories and Josh was about to stop him right there when he heard it too. There was a very distinct crunching noise coming from the bushes not too far away, and it definitely didn’t sound like a deer. 

“Yeah,” he laughed nervously, “I don’t like that, let’s go.” Josh wrapped an arm around Tyler’s waist and the two of them walked very quickly indeed to their campsite. 

“See?” Tyler hissed. “I told you there was a crunch!”

“What do you want, a medal or something? Walk!” Josh whisper shouted back, now very, very alarmed. 

They arrived at their tent safely and hunkered down in their sleeping bags where no monsters or Crunches could get them. Josh changed into pajamas in his sleeping bag which wasn’t very easy, but he did his best. His pillow was cold against his cheek so he pulled his beanie down over the sides of his face so only his nose and below were exposed. 

Tyler kissed him gently and he smiled. 

“Safe and sound from The Crunch Man,” he teased.

“NO,” Josh moaned, trying not to move his face while he spoke. “No more Crunch Men tonight. We can fight them in the morning with big sticks and rocks, if we must.”

“But they’re stronger at night. That’s when they Crunch.”

“Tyler, shut the fuck up,” Josh laughed, burying his face in his pillow. “Go to sleep and dream of Patrick and whoever the fuck he dated, okay? Just… no more Crunching.”

“You’re the worst boyfriend,” Tyler giggled.

“You get what you get and you don’t pitch a fit.” Josh’s eyes weren’t open anymore. He was falling asleep before he knew it. And he didn’t even dream of The Crunch Man.


	4. Frank Dies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Teenagers are bad at everything

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise this chapter is about mikey

God _damn_ , it was cold, Mikey thought, pulling his sleeping bag higher up over his body. All of the layers he wore weren’t doing him very much good in the heat department. He curled up and brought his knees to his chest. A slow breeze blew right through the walls of the tent like they weren’t even there. And the breeze was heavy too, like there was a storm brewing far off. Mikey didn’t like it one bit; the cold, the sleeplessness, his attitude. But worst of all was the fact that it wasn’t the cold keeping him awake.

In cold weather, he could hunker down and lull himself off if he needed to, but it was his mind that was being a problem, not the chill. Pete finally let him in on what was causing him to break down every so often, and shit, Mikey remembered thinking, that was a lot to have on your mind. Now Mikey was an insomniac because of second-hand worries. Mikey thought it was dumb, but he couldn’t stop himself. 

Pete was the one who deserved to be as worried as Mikey felt, and he was. So the both of them were plunging through the worries together and nothing productive was happening because of it. He’d been out for hours but Mikey didn’t want to risk waking him up by snuggling closer for his own benefit. Not after he’d finally crashed at two a.m.. 

Back at home, Mikey never saw how badly it was getting to him. Out in the wild, there was nothing else for Mikey to see. All day every day, Pete was hiding that pain, in his smile, in his words, in his eyes. His eyes were shut now, but Mikey couldn’t stop staring at them. Mostly, he felt like a bad boyfriend. He wanted to help, and he knew staying up all night didn’t help anyone. 

He pulled his beanie down over his eyes. Blindly, he reached over to Pete’s side of the air mattress they were sharing and grabbed his hand. Despite being out in the cold air, Pete’s hand practically buzzed with warmth. Just knowing he was still there was enough for Mikey to sleep for whatever remaining time he had left. 

~

The morning was a lot less dreary than the night had been. Pete was gone when Mikey woke up, but judging by the warm sleeping bag, he hadn’t been gone long. Maybe he only left for a moment and would come back soon, hoped Mikey, who really didn’t want to get up yet.

The sky was grey with early morning clouds, and Pete wasn’t back by the time they began to burn off. Mikey reached for his glasses, and it took him embarrassingly long to find them. He sat up and readjusted his hat, pulling it down over his ears, not for warmth, but for aesthetic. The night had given way to morning and the air was warmer. Mikey took off a layer and pulled on his converse. 

Gerard was up, sipping coffee and flipping through the pages of some comic Mikey had probably already read. He sat in the campfire chairs for some reason, even though there was a perfectly good picnic table five feet from him. Mikey sat down next to him and accepted the coffee cup when Gerard offered it. 

“I think Hudson’s dead,” he whispered, breaking the comfy morning silence.

Mikey snorted while he sipped. “Oh, yeah?” He gave the cup back to Gerard.

“Mhm.” Sip. “Real late last night I heard someone whisper-shouting about Hudson peeing too close to the tent or something.” Sip. “And I haven’t seen him yet this morning.” Sip.

Gerard downed the rest of the coffee and set the mug by his feet. He was kidding about the Hudson being murdered thing, of course. There was no actual child abuse happening at site seventeen, fortunately. 

“How long have you been awake?” Mikey asked. 

“Not long. After the sun rose, but this morning grey hasn’t cleared off yet, so we’ll see. I hope they don’t disturb Spencer’s hiking plans.”

Mikey had completely forgotten about the alleged hike later that day, and he didn’t care either. “Seen Pete?”

“Yeah, a couple minutes ago he got up and walked off. That boy is getting, like, zero sleep. Is he okay?”

Mikey could tell Gerard only half meant his question, but if Pete was that obvious then he must be going downhill. Pete didn’t like hiding things, as evident by literally every secret he’d ever had. But Mikey knew this was a big one and he didn’t want to see it blown before Pete got the chance to tell people himself, if he wanted to.

“Yeah, he’ll be all right,” Mikey replied plainly. He muttered something excusing himself and returned to the tent to grab something. He dug out a pill case in a plastic bag from a heap of dirty clothes.

“Are those Pete’s?” Gerard asked, appearing behind Mikey like a ghost. It went without saying that the pills weren’t Mikey’s.

Mikey kept his mouth shut. It definitely was not Gerard’s business, so silently he checked the Monday slot. Only one pill remained, meaning Pete didn’t plan on going back to sleep, which he realistically should. Pete only took them once he was up for good. “Yes.”

“What are they for?” inquired Gerard. 

“That’s not for me to say,” replied Mikey, putting the pill case back in the bag. 

“They’re antidepressants,” interjected Pete out of nowhere. He pulled Mikey back over to the campfire chairs and sat down on his lap. He kicked his feet up onto the rim of the fire pit. 

“Dallon and Spencer broke one of the chairs doing this already,” Mikey complained, not that he wanted Pete to move.

Pete shrugged and looked up at the sky. Mikey caught Gerard’s eye and the two of them shared a silent conversation about whether or not Pete was definitively okay. The easy answer was no, he was not. But Mikey didn’t go into detail for everyone’s sake. 

“Cool beans,” Gerard said. “I’m gonna make more coffee, before the gremlins wake up.” He gestured toward Lindsey and Hayley’s tent. 

“How did you sleep?” Mikey hummed, encasing Pete with his arms like a seatbelt.

“Whenever you ask that I’m reminded that I’m not sleeping, just so you know. But out of the four hours I got, not badly.”

“That’s more than last night, though!” Mikey whispered encouragingly. 

“I wonder how long it’ll take me to die from sleep deprivation if I’m getting three to four hours every night.” Pete was joking and Mikey tried to find it funny. Mostly, it reminded him of death and judging by the look in Pete’s eyes, it reminded him too. They both wished he hadn’t said anything.

Gerard returned with a sack of jelly beans. “You two look miserable. Jelly beans help.”

“I toured the Jelly Belly factory once,” Pete piped up, shoving a billion jelly beans in his mouth. “It was weird, I felt like Charlie from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. And there was a stable super close by, so I can guess what happens to all those ripe horse bones.”

Mikey ate a handful. “Mmm, horse bones.”

“The best way to start your day,” Gerard snickered, walking back over to the bear box. 

Pete tried to turn around on Mikey’s lap. “Come here, I wanna feed you jelly beans. Quick, before the depression sets in.”

Mikey laughed and allowed this. “Ew. You had to feed me a buttered popcorn flavoured jelly bean? That’s literally spousal abuse.”

“God hates me,” Pete sighed, enjoying the grimace on Mikey’s face as he tried to swallow the jelly bean. Mikey kinda agreed.

“But hey, the good news is that we’re going on a hike today, according to Spencer, so hopefully your mind will be focused on other, happier things.” He ate another jelly bean. “Like horse bones.”

“Food is too cool. I bet ninety thousand years ago, people weren’t like, ‘hey let’s go turn that horse into some little beans that give us three calories each and taste like ass’,” Pete laughed, ignoring the first part of Mikey’s sentence. 

“Like you would know! Didn’t you fail history?” 

“That’s so superficial, Mikes. I may have missed a few assignments—”

“YOU SKIPPED EVERY SINGLE CLASS—”

“MAYBE SO, but I still have history knowledge from other years,” Pete stated. 

“When was the declaration of independence signed?”

“Who the hell cares?” asked Pete, once Pete remembered he didn’t know when the declaration of independence was signed.

Mikey gave up. He touched the bags under Pete’s eyes and tried not to show how worried he was. They watched each other for a few moments before Mikey decided he wanted to stand up. Easier said than done. 

“Come on, let’s go get some real food,” he said, offering his hand to Pete. Normally, Mikey wouldn’t have made an effort to stick to generic meal times and such, but a few things made him act otherwise. For one, the wilderness made him hungrier than usual (he’d been noticing that over the course of the last few days), and then there was Pete. 

Mikey had to make an effort for him. He had to eat proper portions and stay hydrated. He had to get a good amount of sleep and remind him to take meds. He had to be a good example, he had to be a constant source of positivity. Mikey didn’t pretend it wasn’t hard, but he cared way too damn much to be a reason for Pete to break down. 

~

Spencer came by not long after they’d finished eating. Mikey was washing his plate off in the spigot along the road, therefore the first to one to spot the hoard coming his way. 

It seemed that all of site ten had decided to make an early morning drop-in. Loud and boisterous, everyone in the camp was well-awake by the time they reached eighteen. 

“Morning, son,” Spencer said, walking up to him. 

Mikey made a face at “son”. 

“How’d you sleep?” Spencer asked casually, while the rest of the group descended like vultures on eighteen. 

Mikey thought back to all the tossing and turning, all the sighing and worrying, and how long the night had felt because he hadn’t slept through all that much of it. He put on a smile. “Just fine. You?”

“Great. In the morning, the sunlight filters through smoky air and tall grasses behind my tent and it’s just so beautiful…”

Mikey couldn’t think of a shitty poet to compare him to, so he said nothing. 

“I’m still just really hyped to be here. And today we’re still on for the hike, right? Everyone’s down?” Spencer enthused. 

Still-tired Mikey took Spencer’s words one at a time, so he took a little while to respond. “Yeah, I think so. Sounds good to me.”

Spencer took off down the pathway toward site eighteen and hopped into the first conversation he could hear. Mikey waited by the spigot, watching. As he had been often doing, his eyes wandered to Pete, who was chiming in now and again, smiling, and engaging. That lifted a little bit of weight off of Mikey’s chest. 

He went down to his tent to change for the hike. Midway through yanking his hoodie off, Pete barreled in after him, diving onto the mattress.

“Ready for the hikey, Mikey?” he laughed, pulling his own shirt off and zipping the tent shut. 

Mikey rolled his eyes and handed his glasses over for Pete to hold. He pulled on a different shirt before he replied. “I guess. I don’t really like walking, but if it’s pretty enough, and there’s these pools that Spencer keeps talking about… Could be fun.”

“Well, you know with me going that it’s going to be pretty, one way or another,” Pete joked. “But that’s obvious. I think it’ll be good to get out of camp, see some new shit. Maybe I’ll get inspired and write a sonnet about birds or something. Perhaps being in nature will cure my depression, like my weird aunt who sells essential oils keeps telling me. Maybe I will get lost and a bear will guide me to my campsite—”

“Stop bullying our outdoor ed teacher. I think he was serious about that bear thing. Seriously.”

“Jeez.” Pete laid back on the bed and put a hand to his forehead. “That guy has a kid, right? Oh, boy.” 

Mikey snickered and gave up trying to untie his shoelaces. He leaned back on the bed and rolled into Pete’s arms, where he enjoyed dwelling. “Maybe we could not go… just stay here and be together.”

Outside, Spencer hollered that lift off was in fifteen minutes at site ten. 

“It’s for the best,” Pete sighed. “I can’t risk getting annihilated by another horsefly.”

Mikey rolled up Pete’s sleeve to see the mark where the fly bit him. It looked better, but still not great. Not knowing a damn thing about horsefly diseases or lack thereof, Mikey kissed the welt gently and laid back down. 

Pete pretended that didn’t make him blush. He tried to. He tried to act like an experienced person, yet whenever Mikey did anything sweet, he practically swooned. And at that point in their relationship, Mikey knew that. 

He leaned up to kiss Pete, and instinctively, Pete rolled over on top of him. Neither of them had any intention of fucking around right then, but it came to them like clockwork. 

“I really don’t think we have time,” said Mikey in between lip-locks. 

“Probably. What’s the record time?”

“Between us or in general?” Mikey asked. 

“I mean, we definitely hold the title, so…”

“Five minutes,” Mikey grinned. He wasn’t sure whether to say ‘we could beat that’ or ‘we could top that’ because either incited a remark from Pete, so he just raised his eyebrows and bit his lip.

Somebody whacked the side of their tent very hard, repeatedly. “THESE WALLS ARE _VERY_ THIN.” Gerard stood there for a second and then whacked the tent one more time before tromping away. 

Both Mikey and Pete sat up ridiculously quickly, having deep-set fears regarding walk-ins. Mikey’s room at home didn’t have any locks. Hearing Gerard was like a countdown to therapy. His words stuck, though, and Pete and Mikey got ready for the hike. 

Pete noticeably cheered as they packed their shit in bags and put on their big, important hiking shoes that cost way more than converse. Mikey took his hand as they walked down the cement road to site ten. 

“Gross,” said Frank, sarcastically rolling his eyes. 

Mikey felt the urge to go full mom-mode and snap at Frank for not understanding the circumstances, but he remembered not to be a hard-ass before he could. 

Gerard swooped in and spanked Frank on the ass as a hello. Frank squeaked and then made a tough face to cover up that squeak. He also caught the ‘hello, hypocrite’ faces that Pete and Mikey were making. 

“Normal people use their words, Gerard,” he hissed, definitely not smiling at all. 

“Oh. I thought you liked it when I used my hands,” Gerard replied, shrugging it off. 

Frank opened his mouth like he really, really wanted to reply to that, but he honest to God couldn’t with Pete and Mikey right fucking there. 

“God, that’s still so gross,” Mikey mumbled, pushing his glasses up so he could shove his palms into his eyes. 

The group picked up more people from fourteen. Mikey considered them lucky to have not heard the previous conversations. The new ones were much better anyway. 

“They’re gonna get you, Ray, and you’re gonna die. You’re gonna die, man!” shouted Patrick, trailing behind Ray as he caught up with the rest of the group. 

“Maybe so, but like I said, I’m taking them with me!” he replied overzealously, emphasizing how many times they have had this conversation.

“Damn, Ray, didn’t peg you for the murderous tendencies. I thought I saw that in Brendon’s future,” Pete snorted. “Who are we killing?”

_We?_ Mikey thought. 

Ray walked in the middle of the group. “Those rednecks! They were up again with the chainsaw at the ass crack of dawn. Didn’t you hear them?”

“No.”

“YES!” Frank yelled. “So that’s what that was! Shit, I’ll help you sick ‘em.”

“Great,” Patrick sighed. “They’re gonna mow you two down and then come right for us. Thanks, guys.”

“Oh, you’re so welcome,” Frank laughed, rubbing his hands together maliciously. Mikey could see the reruns of Texas Chainsaw Massacre playing behind his eyes. “Can I talk to them first? Intimidation is key.”

“I already did and that’s why Patrick’s so jazzed about it all. They weren’t too friendly. I think I interrupted some sort of ritual. Weird shit, Frankie,” Ray added. 

“Oh, God,” Frank rolled his eyes back into his head, smiling. “This just gets better and better.”

“Stop, you’re giving him a murder boner,” Mikey laughed, elbowing him in the side. 

“I mean, there’s a reason he likes Gerard. Gerard looks like a corpse sometimes,” Pete added in, not that anyone wanted him to.

“Hm, I think this went a little too far,” Ray mumbled. No one heard him.

“I’m not saying Frank would fuck a dead body, but on Halloween--”

“HM, I THINK THIS WENT A LITTLE TOO FAR!” Ray shouted, finishing that thought for Gerard. 

Mikey laughed really hard, despite how grossed out he was. From behind all of the laughter, came close by shouting from site ten. Ryan was dragging Brendon across the road, pointing at a sign, and animatedly yelling. Brendon said something back and Ryan pointed at the sign with both hands and yelled some more. He noticed the crowd and marched over to them.

“Brendon is illiterate. Discuss,” he said.

“Valid,” Frank replied without so much as a beat of silence. 

Heads nodded in agreement. 

“Well apparently so, because…” he pointed back at Brendon by the sign. He looked kinda sad, which didn’t bode well with his bright energy. 

Ryan dragged the group over to the sign and asked Brendon to read it aloud. What is said was “Wright’s Lake campsites” with an arrow pointing down the road, but what Brendon said was,

“Riggit’s Lake campsites.”

“There’s a w! It’s spoken like ‘right’!” Ryan pleaded. 

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it IS! Spencer has said it MULTIPLE TIMES!” Ryan argued. He noticed Spencer preparing for his departure speech, but yanked him off his rock podium to settle the debate. “Pronounced “right”, right? Not “riggit”?”

“Nah, it’s Riggit.”

“EXACTLY-- wait, what?”

“Riggit. Like ribbit, but with g’s instead.” Spencer took a sip of his water bottle hide his grin from Ryan.

Ryan turned to the group of onlookers. 

“Riggit,” said Pete. “Definitely Riggit.”

“Yeah, I thought that too,” said Mikey, knowing damn well it was pronounced “right”. 

Ryan, looking cornered, turned back to Spencer with a last pleading look. Brendon, who stood directly behind Ryan and out of his field of view, was so red that Mikey expected him to explode.

Spencer took another sip of water but he couldn’t take it, and it came out his nose when he started laughing. 

Ryan crossed his arms violently, going pink in the face. “You’re so full of shit, Smith. I hate you all. Fucking fake friends.” But he laughed too, able to take a joke. 

“Fake friends onwards!” Spencer hollered, directing the parade down the street toward the other half of camp. 

They’d have to walk through enemy territory to get to the trailhead, Mikey realized. Almost as soon as that thought registered, he heard a vague “oh, no” from Ray, who was way more spatially aware than Mikey, and actually watched where he was walking. 

Mikey pushed his glasses up so he could see out of them and noticed a band of rough looking, sunburnt white dudes, sitting around drinking Bud Light by the cross roads. 

Frank cracked his knuckles. “Those the bastards?”

Ray looked significantly less eager to have a brawl now. “Yep.” 

The group approached the hicks at a completely normal and not suspicious pace, but they got no peace. The lead rednecker, Mikey assumed, spit and hopped off the stump. He made long strides toward the group, and the group made long, long strides in the other direction. To no avail. 

“Folks!” he yelled, strong and yee-haw-esq. 

Frank cracked his knuckles and made headway toward the hicks, but Gerard caught him the collar of his shirt and held him back, garroting Frank in the process. Gerard looked back at Ray who was giving him weary looks, and at Frank who had bloodlust in his eyes, and decided to keep moving.

Frank was hopping up and down, getting the murder juices flowing. “What, we’re not gonna start a turf war? Come on. Tell me I get to stab a bitch,” Frank whined excitedly.

“SO,” Spencer whisper shouted, calling everyone to attention. “Just keep walking. Don’t make eye contact They have a lot of weapons and we do not.”

“I have a knife in my bag,” Lindsey offered. 

“That’s nice,” Spencer sighed. “But, um, there will be no stabbing and we’ll just mind our own business and everyone will be stab-wound free.”

The redneck in charge yelled something again. He made it clear he wanted their attention. “Better stay on that side of the camp, motherfuckers. We’ll knock you OUT!” 

Nobody moved for a few seconds. The redneck moved closer, activating pack mentality among the kids, and they took off down the trail. Mikey did not look back. 

They made put some solid distance between them and the rednecks before slowing down. A roar of laughter burst out, loud enough that the rednecks down the road heard them, and it aggravated them so much that they started chain smoking. _Subtle_ , Mikey thought. 

Finally, the group pulled themselves together and got hiking. The trail inched eerily close to the now forbidden half of camp, and Mikey started thinking he was seeing rednecks lurking in the bushes behind them. Pete squeezed his hand every time Mikey looked over his shoulder, which was somewhat relieving. 

Pete leaned over and whispered in his ear. “Scaredy cat.”

“Shut up. You don’t even know I was looking for rednecks. I could’ve been…” Mikey couldn’t think of any lies. 

“Please continue, I’m really excited for where this is going to go,” Pete teased.

“Laugh all you want. Skeptics are always the first to go.”

“Save it,” he mumbled, kissing Mikey’s cheek. “I’d win that fight.”

That was a fat lie, but Mikey didn’t mind. Pete being with him at all made him feel better. Mikey was very much on edge from the rednecks, but that was the least of his problems. As the walk rounded the lake and split off past a bridge that he desperately wanted to jump off of, Mikey slowly remembered that he, in fact, did not like walking. Somehow that hadn’t occurred to him. 

It was bearable for him because while he did hate walking—and to an extent, hiking—he didn’t hate it nearly as much as Gerard did. 

Gerard was wearing the only pair of shorts he packed, and they were really black, and really, really, not made for hiking. Gerard reminded everyone, often, throughout the entire trek, that his thighs were chafing and he was not Loving It™. 

“It’s not a long hike,” Spencer reminded him. “Probably a mile, mile and a half at most.”

“Fuck me, man! First you’re Mr. Barbie, and now you’re the coach. Do you know how much I absolutely do not need more P.E. in my life?” Gerard exclaimed, making sure everyone knew just how little patience he had. 

“I’d carry you but I think that would end very badly for both of us,” Frank offered, but didn’t really offer. 

“And Mikey can’t carry me because he’s, like, three pounds total,” Gerard continued.

“And I honestly don’t trust Pete to carry you after he publicly admitted that he thinks you’re hot,” Mikey said, putting the final nail in the coffin. 

“That was ONE TIME!” Pete howled.

Gerard pulled his hair up in a ponytail with one hand and pointed to his sweaty face with the other. “That’s because I am hot, Mikey.”

Soon they left behind the shade of the trees and hiked up the surrounding expanse of white granite. No trees, no shade. The heat reflected off the ground, and Mikey felt like he was getting doubled-timed by the fucking sun. The pack struggled up the small incline, taking multiple breaks for water and to catch their breath. The air smelled like dust and sweat and sunscreen. Nothing like fresh mountain air, Spencer had said to them, like the bitch ass liar he was. They plundered forward, led by said fearless leader, who did not know how to read his map. 

Miraculously, they ended up on the right path. The air started to smell fresher and cleaner. The sun didn’t feel so bad anymore because a cool breeze swept the heat off their skin. More trees came into sight, like an oasis in the middle of a rocky desert. 

“Aha!” Spencer bellowed. “This is the half way marker! Just so everyone knows, I do know where the fuck I’m going so stop pestering me, BRENDON. Please be careful crossing the stream ahead, the rocks are mossy and slippery. I’ll leave you to die if you fall and crack your head open. Just FYI.”

“We’re off to cross the river!” sang Pete, to the tune of “The Wizard of Oz”. 

Spencer led by example and crossed the stream safely and efficiently, but being a group of shit-head teens, they weren’t about to follow said example. Hayley and Lindsey tried to hold onto one another when they slipped and ended up with matching bumps on their heads. Spencer, a man of his word, didn’t check to see if they were all right.

Joe walked straight through the stream, in his “no-fucks-given” way. Mikey did his best to not slip and die, but it was a struggle. Balance wasn’t his strongest suit. 

Back out of the brief forest they went, and for another agonizing fifteen minutes, they marched along like ants in a row. Pete pulled him aside and they kissed in an oasis of shade for a couple of moments. He tasted sweaty and it was kinda gross, but Mikey was certain he didn’t taste like candy either. They nearly lost their group, but it wasn’t a terrible adventure overall. Not soon enough, Spencer hopped atop the largest rock he could find and shouted for attention. God, Mikey was sick of those speeches. 

“Comrades! I hath brought you to the Promise Land!”

“It’s PromiseD Land,” mumbled Dallon, somewhere to Mikey’s left. 

“What?” Spencer asked.

“PromiseD Land. You say Promise Land.”

“Aren’t you a Mormon?”

Dallon crossed his arms. “Contractually.”

Spencer turned back to the crowd, the sweaty, sweaty crowd. “Beneath me are the Emerald Pools! Again, be careful. Don’t litter. Beware of the bees. Have fun!”

People hurried down the path without waiting another second more. Mikey stuck with Pete, who had been grimacing ever since Spencer mentioned bees. Mikey didn’t have the heart to remind him that he’d been bitten by a horsefly, not a bee. 

Mikey got lost in his imagination as he climbed down the hill. Dust rose as people kicked through the dry ground, and stained everyone’s claves light brown. Dried roots sprung from the ground and rocks that had previously been anchored down were loose and easily tripped over. Space cadet Mikey Way stumbled over nearly every single root on his way down. Pete kept catching him, which made Mikey feel a little babied. At least he hadn’t knocked out any teeth or broken his glasses. 

As the climate got more humid and the breeze blew cool air, Mikey stopped minding the ravaging heat and the long walk. He could’ve walked another mile at that point. Pete tapped his shoulder and brought him out of his daydream. As he beamed back down to Earth, Mikey wasn’t sure what the tap had been for. 

His breath caught on some dust in his throat as he looked up. Green waterfalls, rushing and frothing, spilled down rock faces into deep, clear pools and sprayed mist up into the air, creating little rainbows. The sound of running water cooled him down. He reached for Pete unconsciously.

“Wanna, like, fuck off the grid and live here forever?” Mikey asked, exploring with his eyes.

“Kinda,” Pete admitted. 

Mikey felt like he transcended the mortal plane and ended up in the fey world or something. It couldn’t be real, none of it. Ten minutes ago he’d been walking around the fucking Sahara, with stupid, shitty rocks, and trees that felt and looked like they were already one fire. But the air here was colder and the sunlight wasn’t so sharp. His mind relaxed and his body followed. 

Pete led him down toward smooth rocks and shallow shores, toasted by the sun. To be there felt like black friday all of the sudden; people swarmed the area, throwing down towels and cracking sodas open. Pete yanked him ahead and secured a spot under a baby pine tree that provided the most minimal but utterly appreciated shade. The rock Mikey sat on was cool, and Mikey hadn’t thought about it before, but bare ass on hot rocks did not sound fun. Poor Gee, thought Mikey.

Pete dipped his feet into the calm offset of the main stream that ran by them and exclaimed loudly that this place “made him believe in God again”. He pointed to Lindsey. “I’m coming for your God.”

Lindsey climbed onto a rock overhanging the largest swimming pool. “Not if I get there first!” She backflipped into the water. Everyone cheered, Pete included. 

“Damn,” Pete sighed, turning back to Mikey. “She always beats me to the punch. Come on, Mikes, let’s take a dip.”

“Okay, go put your suit on,” said Mikey, revealing he’d been smart enough to put his suit on under his hiking shorts. “Go on, there’s a modesty shrub over there.” Mikey laughed at the words ‘modesty shrub’. 

“Why bother?” asked Pete, stripping down right then and there. 

Mikey repressed his laughter and looked away.

“Really, Pete?” shouted Spencer from across the falls. “Walk ten feet to your right and none of us have to witness—”

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before, thanks to Brendon!” Pete shot a glare his way, but Brendon was too engrossed in a sandwich--very possibly only mayonnaise and bread--to care. Pete pulled on his swim trunks and hopped over to the big pool. He high-fived Lindsey who was crawling out of the water like a cast-away reaching some drift-wood. 

“How was God, Linds?” Mikey asked, pulling off his shirt. 

“Wet.”

“Ah, good to know,” Pete replied. “I’ll put plastic on the couch.”

“Just like Grandma,” said Hayley, without once using common sense. 

Everyone stood silently, absorbing what she said. 

“Well,” Pete said. “I’m gonna go drown myself now.”

Mikey tagged along because he didn’t like Hayley’s implications either. He stood at the water’s edge so the lull of the waves lapped at his feet. He listened to Pete ramble, just to hear him talk. He noticed something.

He poked Pete’s neck. “You have a mark.”

“Do I?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, cool. Thanks,” Pete laughed. 

“You’re welcome,” snickered Mikey. “Hope that fades quickly. People give us enough shit for being sex-addicted teenagers.”

“People need to loosen up,” Pete hesitated after those words. Without warning, he shoved Mikey into an Emerald Pool. “See Mikey?” he asked, when Mikey resurfaced, holding his glasses with one hand and wiping his eyes with the other. “Loosen up!”

Holy damn the water was cold, thought Mikey.

All of his fleeting body heat condensed into a burst of energy and he shot out of the water to take Pete down with him. Both of them hit the water like an asteroid and sank underneath the waves they created. Coughing and splashing, they re-emerged. Pete splashed him in the face, and Mikey could only do so much to defend himself, his glasses still in his hand. Luckily, Pete kicked a rock and had to use both his arms to keep his head above water. Mikey towed both of them over to the shallows.

He reached for his shirt to dry off his glasses, but obviously he wasn’t wearing one. Pete laughed good and hard at that. Mikey splashed him again, then he put the glasses on Pete so he wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore. 

“God, you really can’t see shit, huh?” Pete wheezed, still coughing up water. 

“No, Pete, I wear them for fun,” Mikey joked sarcastically. He pressed his back against the hot rocks and stared up at the fuzzy clouds in the distance. 

“Oh, hey, Mikes,” Pete sat up and put Mikey’s glasses on his head. “See that over there?”

“No.”

“Shit,” Pete laughed, handing the glasses back. “There’s a waterfall. I’m gonna climb it and see what’s up there. Wanna come with? We can form a cult up there or something.”

“You’re gonna climb the waterfall?” Mikey inquired.

“Y—shut up, you know what I meant. Bitch.” Pete slid his body back into the water, since he apparently had an invisible layer of blubber. 

“I’m down. What if we don’t even have to form a cult because we find one? Naked people around a bonfire, all worshipping the devil and shit.”

“Hot. There’s some sacrifices in the middle, maybe a skull or two--”

“—Everyone’s talking in Latin—”

“—BACKWARDS!” they yelled in unison. 

“Fuck, that’d be so cool,” sighed Mikey, grinning wide. “They kidnap us and we get sacrificed to satan.”

“Not gonna lie, I’d be more than willing to be murdered by a cult. But only if it’s—”

“IMAGINE BEING CRUCIFIED!” Mikey cut in, eyes wider than the moon. 

“Fuuuuck,” Pete groaned. Then he paused, and looked at Mikey with deep-seated darkness in his eyes. “What if they ate us afterward? Like cut us open and fucking ate us.”

“They’d sleep in our bodies like Luke in The Empire Strikes Back.”

“Wow, didn’t think you could turn Star Wars into a shitty cult film, but you’ve got powers beyond my imagination, Mikeyway,” Pete said. He focused on something behind Mikey and stood up.

Mikey looked back over his shoulder, but saw nothing in the thick bushes and patchy shade. He turned back to Pete and also stood up. His glasses were all wet and smudgy. He couldn’t see all that well, but Pete could’ve just been fucking with him.

“Did you see that?” he asked, again.

Mikey rolled his eyes. “No, sorry.”

“There’s, like, a thing there.”

“Oh, yeah? Like the cult you were talking about?” Mikey asked sarcastically. 

Pete shivered. “Maybe. I dunno what it was. Something made the bushes ruffle.”

“Something sinister like the wind?” When he was sacred, Mikey’s best defense was offense. 

“Fuck no. I swear I saw… something…” Pete squinted and took a step forward, but Mikey held a hand out to hold him back. 

And all of the sudden he remembered it was a hot sunny day and he had no reason in hell to be as scared as he was now. 

“Who’s a scaredy cat now?” Mikey teased, walking nonchalantly over to the bushes. He picked up a stick and whacked the bushes a few times. He turned back to Pete. “See? Nothing there. And you pick on me for being a—”

“BOO!”

Mikey screamed so loud the whole encampment seemed to jump. He whirled around and angrily kicked Lindsey, who had jumped out of the bushes. She fell to the ground from laughing so hard. When she begged for mercy, Mikey turned on Pete, who was hands on knees, crying into the water. 

“You’re such a terrible—” Mikey shoved him into the water and didn’t finish his sentence. He barged in after him and splashed him some more. Just because he could. “Fucking—awful—mean—”

Pete wheezed and held onto Mikey for dear life, laughing too hard to swim. 

“Hey! Shape of water!” Spencer called from the rock Lindsey jumped off earlier. “Wanna come eat with everyone else?”

“NO ONE SAW THAT FURRY FILM—” Pete yelled

Mikey gave Spencer a thumbs up, and dunked Pete one last time. Then he dragged Pete over to the shallows. 

“You look like a prune,” Mikey observed, grabbing his towel but not Pete’s. 

Pete stayed on the hot rocks like a bog body. “Don’t objectify me. And that’s rich, coming from the drowned sewer-rat abomination that’s talking to me.”

Mikey couldn’t resist laughing at that, and helped Pete off the ground. 

“You’re too nice to me,” Pete snickered, collecting his own towel. “Patrick would’ve gone straight for the knees if I said that to him.”

“No he fucking wouldn’t. He’d probably cry. And you’d never say that to Patrick, because I wouldn’t let you,” Mikey returned.

“Wouldn’t say what to Patrick?” Patrick asked. 

“That you look like a drowned sewer-rat,” Pete filled in.

Mikey went straight for the knees, but Pete dodged and both he and his towel fell back into the water. 

“That is what you get for being a little bitch to Patrick,” Mikey stated. 

Amongst the assorted yelling, Brendon was hollering with excitement and Gerard was scolding him for being abusive. Mikey knelt down and picked Pete’s saturated towel out of the stream. He wrung it out and rested it on a tree branch.

“I take back what I said,” Pete muttered, hauling himself up. “You’re just about as nice as everyone else is to me.”

Mikey felt a little pang in his heart, and offered his towel to Pete as retribution. 

“Please,” Pete scoffed. “You don’t have to feel bad just because—” his voice got caught in his throat. “Because of what’s going on with me.”

Mikey rolled his eyes and draped his own damp towel over Pete. “I don’t feel bad.” He was lying.

“You’re lying.”

“Shut up.”

“Are you guys gonna eat with us or not? Do we need a relationship counselor up in here?” asked Lindsey.

“I vote Meagan is the counselor!” Brendon piped up.

“NOT AGAIN! NEVER AGAIN!” Meagan howled. 

“Please will you calm the fuck down,” Pete laughed. “I know I’m the star of the show, but you’re gonna have to learn to get on without me once and awhile.”

Mikey had never seen a group of people collectively ignore a person so fast in his life. He did sorta feel bad for Pete sometimes. No one was immune to insults all the time. 

Mikey and Pete sat down in the circle and relaxed. The sandwiches were consumed in less than five minutes, since everyone was hungrier than they realized. That’s how it worked when you were camping, Mikey figured. 

“Hey, Spence,” Pete chimed in, lettuce falling out of his mouth. “What’s the craziest shit you’ve ever seen up here?”

Mikey tensed and sent an angry look at his shit-head boyfriend. 

“Um,” Spencer replied, caught off guard. “Rednecks, probably? Why?”

“Mikey and I were gonna go looking for a cult.”

“No shit?” Spencer looked like he had a moment of pure epiphany. “Okay, I’ve never told anyone this, but one time when I was like eight, my family came up here for the summer, right? And we went on this hike to a place called Secret Lake, which is a hike we could probably do if people are down for it, but that’s besides the point. So, when we went up there, there was a bunch of really weird landscaping like someone had dug out and weeded the banks but nothing else. And there were a bunch of, like, shacks, I think? Weird, old, mossy buildings with shit carved into them. Names and initials, mostly. But this one… Christ, it scared me for weeks. There was this symbol that I can’t even describe but it must’ve been scary because I was so freaked out I ran back to my family. But then I tripped over something and it was a couple of candles and a doll, and I ran for my fucking life. Never been back.”

“Ho-ho-holy shit,” Pete yelped. “Ferb, I know what we’re gonna do tomorrow!”

“Sure,” Spencer said, taking a sip of water like it was nothing. 

“You really think there are cultists out here?” Ray asked, biting his nails. 

“No, not really,” Spencer admitted.

“Spencer, your mouth is like a fun vacuum,” Pete whined. “Sucks the fun out of everything.”

Spencer laughed. “You have no idea.”

Pete turned to Mikey and made a gagging face. “Didn’t need to hear that,” he whispered, shutting his eyes. “Didn't need to picture it either. Yuck.”

Mikey laughed quietly and turned back to the rest of the group. He noticed Brendon popping an Adderall, and nudged Pete. “Your turn.” Mikey didn’t mean to be a mom, but he couldn’t help it. Not when Pete was so hell-bent on feeling like everything was his fault and being miserable. 

Pete got up and went to go take a pill, and Mikey prayed that someone—anyone—would keep the general public entertained and no one would make a big deal out of it. But when did Mikey ever get what he wanted?

“PETE!” Brendon yelled. “MY MANS! FELLOW DRUGGIE! WHAT ARE WE HAVING TODAY, SIR?” 

He didn’t know any better, Mikey told himself. So Mikey glared his best glare and said nothing. Brendon dropped the subject too, but it was too late. Everyone had already looked at Pete and it was all said and done.

“What are those for?” asked a voice that Mikey couldn’t even discern before snapping,

“Hey, why don’t you mind your fucking business?”

Well, the voice belonged to Frank and the two of them stared at each other for a few moments before it got too tense. Nobody asked any other questions, but enough had been said. As far as everyone else knew, Pete was taking something for some reason and it was probably a big deal. Pete sat back down and ignored it all together. 

Gerard caught Mikey’s attention and silently shamed him for snapping like that. Sometimes Gerard acted an awful lot like their mom. Mikey silently apologized and then Gerard made a grand gesture to get everyone into the water. It probably wouldn’t have worked as well if people weren’t already looking for an excuse to leave the circle of horrible awkwardness. 

Everybody got up and left, including Patrick, who probably knew what was going on, Mikey assumed. 

“Not to be passive aggressive or hypocritical but could you not snap like that? I can handle this on my own, I don’t need you to defend my honor, or whatever,” Pete said. 

“Okay. Sorry.” Mikey didn’t let on how high strung he was. He didn’t need Pete feeling like it was his fault. 

“I think I’m gonna have to tell them.”

“What makes you think that?” Mikey asked.

“I don’t like keeping secrets. I’m not good at it either. No offense, but neither are you.”

Mikey smiled a little. “I know that.”

“Should I?”

“That’s your business, make whatever decision you want. They’d support you if you did, though.”

“Great,” Pete laughed apathetically. “More people acting like my mother.”

Mikey made a face, feeling like that was a jab at him. 

Pete got up and ruffled Mikey’s hair. Then he ran and cannon-balled back into the biggest pool, nearly killing Joe in the process. Mikey hoped he hadn’t hit another rock. 

Mikey sat back under the sun and summoned all of his brain power. He didn’t want Pete to feel crowded by Mikey’s supportiveness, but Mikey was really, really scared of what would happen if all of the sudden he backed away. He decided not to make up his mind right there, so he followed in Pete’s footsteps and flung himself off of the jumping rock. The rush of cold water helped clear his head.

In one end, people splashed and dove and pulled slimy things up from the bottom, and at the other, there was calm. Back float, cucumbers on eyelids type calm. All within the space of about forty feet. Mikey treaded water in the middle, enjoying the lapping waves from his left and the quiet from his right. 

But Mikey made for the middle and swam across the pool to the rocky slope Pete was scraping his knees on. Pete was maybe halfway up the rocks by the time Mikey reached the bank. It was also made of rocks and putting his weight on it, Mikey figured out really fast why Pete’s knees were bleeding. 

He climbed out of the water after Pete. “Still looking for that cult that Spencer doesn’t believe in?” 

“I don’t need anybody to believe in what I believe in as long as I believe in it,” Pete replied, scratching a knee on the rough slope.

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“You don’t make any sense.”

“Right, _I’m_ the child in this relationship,” Mikey rolled his eyes and dawned the slope. 

He began to climb up the side of the rock, squabbling with Pete in his brain. In the end, he had to bite his tongue because Pete was still hurting underneath it all. But he couldn’t be too nice, otherwise he’d get more backhand insults, and he didn’t want that either. Mikey rolled his eyes again as he reached the top of the hill. Pete was perfectly portraying those bitchy girls in movies who didn’t want this or that, even if it was just a gross stereotype. 

Mikey laughed and wiped his scraped up palms on his wet trunks to soothe them. His knees had little bloody scrapes as well. Mikey thought they added character. And Giardia, possibly. 

Pete pointed to the blood. “Knees weak,” he laughed. “Palms are bloody.”

“Cultists in the forest already,” Mikey mumbled, wiping his palms again on his swim trunks. 

“Let’s get dead-y.”

Mikey snorted with laughter so loudly that he slipped and nearly fell to his death. He caught himself on Pete and froze for a few seconds, heart pumping fast. He nearly died. Just like that. It could’ve been over. 

“I didn’t fucking mean it!” Pete wheezed. 

Mikey, wide eyed, smiled in appreciation. It wasn’t every day that you nearly die. At least, not for him. 

“DO A FLIP!” yelled Brendon, giving him a double thumbs up. 

Mikey flipped Brendon off with both hands. Pete also flipped Brendon off, but Mikey was sure Pete just liked doing that. He batted Pete’s hands down and dragged him toward the waterfall. 

There was a bowl of fast moving water right before it fell down into the pool below. Sticks and small rocks were stuck in the current, forming a dam that could almost-sorta-maybe save someone from falling down a waterfall. Mikey didn’t know who that someone was gonna be, but it wasn’t gonna be no one. 

It didn’t look safe. It didn’t even look comfortable. But damn, Mikey wanted to be in it. He slid down the wet rocks and crash-landed in the stream, and he discovered that running water was much colder than still water. 

“Just like an ice bath. I’m gonna wake up tomorrow with organs missing, aren’t I?” Mikey asked, shivering. 

Pete slid in after him. “I mean, who knows what those rednecks are into?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of those cultists, but you never know.” Mikey spread his arms out and pressed them against the hot rocks. Between that and the sun, he might survive with all his limbs. Hypothermia wasn’t out of the question yet.

Pete’s body was still warm too, and Mikey really liked being pressed against him. It was a win-win. Pete liked it too, judging by the stupid smile stuck on his face. They were definitely past the blushy-virgin stage of the relationship, so Mikey didn’t hesitate to pull him in by the face.

Pete wrapped an arm around his shoulder while they kissed, digging his fingers into MIkey’s skin until it nearly hurt. Pete leaned in father when Mikey urged him, and the cultists were wiped from mind like an eraser on a whiteboard. The sun shone on them like a ray from Heaven, which was how Mikey felt, at that very moment. Heavenly. Even as he got hotter and the water got colder in contrast. Just him and Pete in a whirlpool of emotions and heat and nature and all the other good things Mikey didn’t have the time to think of. 

But soon enough Pete’s grip on Mikey’s shoulder started to hurt, and Pete pulled back when Mikey shrugged his hand off. 

“You’re burning up,” Pete laughed, using his hand as a cup to pour some water on Mikey.

“Yeah, that’s thanks to you,” Mikey mumbled, leaning in and grabbing at Pete’s hair. 

Pete smiled, but laughed the kiss off. “No, shit-idiot, you’re getting sunburned.”

“Oh.” Mikey splashed some more water on himself, but it didn’t make the burning go away. Well, shit, Mikey thought, leaning back against the rock. 

“You could use some color,” Pete snickered, slapping the pink skin of Mikey’s shoulder. 

Mikey yelped at the sudden and sharp pain, recoiling like a snake. If his burn hurt that bad now, tomorrow would be worse. Better to save what little skin cells he had left, so he got out of the pool after submerging one last time. 

“On on, Pete,” Mikey sighed, covering his burns with his hands. The impromptu shield didn’t save him any anguish. When Pete didn’t follow, Mikey asked, “What? You want me to get skin cancer that badly?”

Pete opened his mouth and closed it before saying a thing. 

Shit. A bad joke on Mikey’s behalf. “Sorry. Really, I’m—you know I didn’t mean to say that. Or, I didn’t mean it like that. I—”

“No, stop it. Stop babying me.” Pete got up and faced Mikey head on. “I get that you feel responsible for me because I’m vulnerable now, or whatever, but just stop, okay?”

“Stop what? Trying to be helpful?” Mikey couldn’t see where this was coming from, and he couldn’t defend himself from it so suddenly. 

“Stop trying to be P.C. or whatever the fuck you’re doing. You’re not my therapist, you’re my boyfriend, I don’t need another source of pity in my life. I’m not fragile, okay? Or, maybe I am, but you and everyone else are treating me like I should feel fragile. Like if I take a wrong step I’ll shatter. You know whose business that is? Mine.”

“Okay, so what do you want me to do? Ignore the fact that you’re going through some shit and live life as normal?” Mikey asked, one foot on the ground and one foot in wherever the fuck this had come from. 

“If that’s what it takes for you to stop treating me like I’m gonna kill myself at the first sign of a problem!”

“I’m not! I’m just trying to be there for you, because I know—”

“You don’t know! You honestly do not know what I feel like. So stop therapizing me and let me deal with my shit on my own.”

Mikey stared at him. “You want me to fuck off to neverland for a few hours until you pull yourself together?” 

Pete crossed his arms, breathing heavily. He looked on the verge of a panic attack, and Mikey knew it was time to back down. 

“Okay,” Mikey said, trying not to use his sappy ‘everything is gonna be all right’ voice. 

“God, you’re such a pushover,” Pete groaned. 

_“What?”_

“You’re gonna do anything I ask because I’m depressed, right? That’s how this works?”

“Do you want me to leave you alone or not?”

Pete pouted, stumped. “I just—” The panic intensified tenfold. 

Mikey almost gave in to accommodate Pete’s hysteria, but he stopped because the whole reason for this argument was that he should stop doing that. So he waited, painfully, for Pete to reply. 

Finally Pete realized he didn’t have an answer and so he cracked his neck, uttered, “Just fuck off,” and walked away. Like changing frames in a stop motion film, the moment he got to the bottom, there was another fake smile plastered on his face. 

“God, what a NIGHTMARE!” Mikey shouted into the forest. He took a few breaths and bit his nails, trying desperately to think straight. He couldn’t be mad at Pete, he couldn’t be mad, he kept telling himself. But wasn’t that what Pete wanted? 

“No, that’s what he thinks he wants. But then how do I know any better? Fuck,” Mikey sighed, rubbing his eyes. He didn’t want to be up there anymore. He wanted to be home, so he could curl up in his bed and watch movies on his phone, and eat cheetos until his hands were stained for a week. He just didn’t want to be there. Leave it to Pete to ruin something so perfect. 

Mikey grumped down the slope and pouted through the pool. Spencer didn’t say a word when he passed Mikey sitting in the shade with a towel over his body so he looked like a human laundry basket. Mikey was glad about that. If anybody, no matter how unintentionally, gave him a reason, he would lash out and then hate himself for it because that was the mood he was in. Shitty. Shitty, shitty, shitty. 

People around him still seemed to be having fun. From what he could hear, Brendon and a few others went down stream as far as they could. At some point, Meagan asked where Hayley and Lindsey were, but nobody knew. Mikey’s mind wandered, but those were his friends, so he reigned it back in. Aforementioned bees kept buzzing too close for comfort, so every couple of minutes, Mikey swatted aimlessly at the sound, and whacked a few people unintentionally. Either they had amazing spidey-senses or they’d heard the exchange on top of the waterfall, because nobody said shit. 

Somebody tapped him not much later. “Time to pack up, unless you wanna get left behind,” Frank said. 

“Kinda do.”

“Tough shit. Pack up your stuff because I’m not leaving without you.”

“Go make out with my brother,” Mikey grumbled.

“I will kick the shit out of you if you say that to me ever again,” Frank intoned. 

Mikey took the towel off of his face, smirking. “You signed up for this.” He held a hand up.

Frank grabbed it and helped him stand. “Signed up for what? Verbal abuse from a sentient walking stick?”

“Constant nagging from your best friend,” Mikey corrected him, pulling on a shirt. 

“Fair,” Frank agreed. Then he inhaled sharply and started to laugh. “Dude, you are gonna be in agony tomorrow. Those burns look you got acupuncture from satan or something.”

“Acupuncture from satan is our new band name,” Mikey said, pulling shorts on over his damp swimsuit. He wrapped his towel around his head like a scarf, and slipped on his shoes. Which was a real trick, since they weren’t exactly slip on’s. Mikey didn’t think they made slip on hiking shoes. 

Frank led him to the departure circle where people were taking last minute photos and tying their shoelaces. Mikey saw Pete hovering in the back, looking like he had something to say. Unfortunately, he caught Mikey’s glance and clenched his jaw. Whatever it was, he wasn’t gonna do it now. 

Not when he knew he’d only receive more pity, as he himself had put it. 

Frank tried to make him smile for a photo, which he didn’t do, but he was forced to be in the photo regardless. And from there, they left down the trail from whence they’d come. Frank walked and talked and slipped on rocks until he limped, and Mikey managed to forget about Pete from time to time. His wet hair blocked his view of Pete, which he assumed was some emo God’s way of telling him to forget about it and circle back later. He was tempted to ignore the divine intervention, but then Frank jumped off a very large rock and questionably broke his ankle, and Mikey was transformed into a human crutch. 

“This is just like when you jumped off the school bus,” Gerard chastised. “You fucked all your shit up then too.”

“You’d think I’d learn my lesson,” Frank snickered, wincing. 

“I thought your ankles would get more durable,” Gerard replied, re-joining Ray, a few paces back. 

Frank looked over his shoulder at Gerard, and Mikey started to get really uncomfortable about the fact that his best friend was dating his brother all over again, so he redirected Frank’s attention. 

“We need to hang out at your house more. Everytime you come over to my house it’s all about Gerard. Plus my games suck. Unless you’re viciously into Minecraft and Skyrim.”

“Which I am not,” Frank laughed.

“And that’s why you suck, but let’s agree to disagree.”

“Emotionally? You’re a vegan,” Frank hissed.

“That’s not that different than a vegetarian, which you are.”

“The difference is dignity,” Frank replied. “Which you don’t have, so we’re back to square one!”

Mikey laughed out loud. “Walk on your own, dickhead.” He let Frank fumble for a few steps. “You know what I could kill for right now?”

Frank grunted. 

“A shower.”

“Really? I thought you Way’s enjoyed the grease.”

“Gerard does. I think he does, **since he never fucking showers!** ” Mikey raised his voice pointedly at Gerard, a couple paces behind them. “However, I have some of that so-called dignity you mentioned.”

Suddenly the group of two became a group of three, as Spencer careened in their direction, crash-landing onto them. “Did someone mention showers?” asked Infomercial Smith. “Because, boy, do I have the thing for you.”

The thing was called a sun shower and it worked by filling up the big plastic sac with water and then leaving it in the sun to heat, so later on, the bag is full of warm water. Then someone hangs it from and tree and uses the spout to shower. Handy, Mikey thought. And also kinda fucking weird. He didn’t want to shower in front of the entire campground. 

“You can keep your suit on,” said Spencer, obviously a mind reader. 

“Oh.” They walked in silence for a few seconds. “Well in that case, could I borrow the thingy? I’m worried I’m gonna start a grease fire.”

“That’s your contact name in my phone,” Frank snorted. 

Spencer laughed along with Frank, and permitted Mikey to steal the do-hicky as soon as they got back to camp. And now that a shower was in his future, Mikey walked considerably faster. Frank’s short little legs and still questionably broken ankle fared poorly. 

The group stopped for water in the grove between granite and the sweet abyss of the Wright’s Lake forest. The shade made everything better. The heat, the angst, the blaring sun that had bleached everyone’s eyes. Mikey couldn’t even see the color green for a few moments when they first arrived. 

He sat on a stump with Frank, back to back, and waited for everyone to refresh. A little stream garbled nearby, filling the area with sweet sounds of summer. Mikey had never been so glad to see a forest in his life, but that feeling stopped abruptly and permanently. 

Frank saw them first. He elbowed Mikey for his attention, and then they both froze, and it had nothing to do with the temperature. Fifty feet away—maximum—trotting in single-file line, were grey animals, bigger than dogs. 

Mikey couldn’t move or speak. 

“Are those wolves?” Frank whispered slowly. When Mikey didn’t reply, Frank kicked whoever was nearest to him, and that person kicked the next, until everyone in the group was a statue, staring in the direction of the beasts. 

“Holy fuck,” Mikey heard Pete whisper. He wanted to walk over and hide behind Pete, or maybe just hold his hand, but he was too shocked to move. He wasn’t so much scared, even. Just surprised and maybe a little concerned. 

“They’re not wolves,” Spencer announced softly.

The pack kept moving, not so much as glancing in the direction of the gawkers. They followed one another, barking at each other every so often, stepping silently over the ground, until they disappeared in the distance. Then the clearing was quiet again, except for the gurgles and bubbles of the stream. 

“Coyotes, then?” Brendon asked. 

“Yeah, I… I guess. I’ve never seen them here before, though.”

Mikey suddenly had no problem believing there were cultists in these woods, too. He tried not to dwell on it, and in another few minutes, the hike continued. The rest was much less eventful. Not a single redneck harassed them, which was a little disappointing. 

The solar shower was interesting. 

Mikey built up a barrier of towels hooked onto clothes lines which wasn’t necessary because he intended to wear his swim trunks. The water was lukewarm at best, but with the biodegradable soap Gerard lent him, he almost felt genuinely clean afterwards. It was that summer-camp clean, where your body wasn’t dirty anymore, but your soul still felt like a dumpster fire. It was good enough.

He towelled off and returned to his tent to put on some not horribly abominated clothing. Halfway through pulling on pants he got bored and collapsed on the bed. Only now was he feeling tired from the hike, and a nap sounded really good. 

He kicked off his pants and rolled over, curling around a sleeping bag and burying his face in a soft pillow. As he drifted off under mottled sunlight, all he could smell was Pete. Pete smelled kinda perfume-y, not like Ryan, but still nice. Also kinda awful, like the way grass stains smell. No matter how it smelled, it was a comfort to Mikey. He grasped Pete’s pillow with his hand and pulled it closer to his heart. He fell asleep curled around the pillow. 

~

A loud shuffling sound echoed around the camp as someone ripped the rain fly off Mikey’s tent. It woke Mikey up and stole a perfectly good dream from him, which he wasn’t pleased about. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” he asked to whomever was out there. It occurred to him it could be rednecks, but it was too late now. 

“Taking off the rain fly,” came Pete’s voice, from somewhere outside. 

“Manhandle my tent a little more, why don’t you?” Mikey grumbled, rolling onto his side. “Why’re you doing that?”

“It’s not gonna rain.”

“It was really grey this morning. What if it rains overnight?”

“It burned off,” Pete said, not answering the question. 

Mikey felt like he should say something, and he almost did. The words were on his lips; he wanted to soothe, to help ease the angst. Pete’s words echoed in his ears, and he held his tongue. 

“Fine.” 

Pete stowed the rain fly on top of the bear box, weighed it down with a rock, and walked away. Mikey caught himself watching him go. 

He could now stare up into space, or as far as his eyes would take him. He watched the clouds and listened to the wind in the trees, but he couldn’t make his internal monologue can it. 

_Shit_ , he thought. He didn’t know what the hell he was doing. Some part of him never let him admit that, but he was alone now. There was no one else to hear him. 

Mikey tried to rub the truth out of his eyes. 

But his eyes closed and he saw the words “what the fuck are you doing?” like the title of a movie, over and over again. It wasn’t so long ago that all Pete was was a way to waste less tissues and lotion, but now… now was different. They saw each other way more, because they wanted to. Sometimes, Mikey would wander over to Pete’s house and stay for dinner, then leave. Nothing would happened. And that was totally okay, but he didn’t know how or when or WHY that had started. 

Mikey didn’t picture himself ever becoming an old married couple with anyone. He figured he’d get married and divorce—”those are just the statistics!”—and then die mysteriously in a McDonalds at the age of 87. 

At the same unfortunate time, laying in bed and just _talking_ with Pete never got old. Pete was a comfortable person if you were just as much of a crackhead as he was, and Mikey was. Mikey assumed that was why they fit so well together. But even acknowledging that much was scary. Because, Mikey thought, he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. 

Was he in a relationship? Yeah, he supposed he was. Had they ever talked about it? Absolutely not. Lindsey said something about communication, but the problem was that they weren’t. And Mikey didn’t know how to fix that or anything else because the truth was, he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. He just wanted to do it right. 

There was something so unfairly scary about admitting what he wanted, that he’d convinced himself that not knowing was better than sitting with empty wishes. A tent in the middle of the forest at five in the afternoon was not the time or place to admit something like this, but he could pretty easily imagine Pete also dying mysteriously in a McDonalds.

Mikey sighed, letting out the breath he’d been keeping in. He felt like a saged house, all the bad energy cleared out for the time being. His eyelids got really heavy and the bed felt soft. That should’ve been it, but he’d opened up a whole new can of worms without knowing it.

Why did he want to do it right? Was it possibly because—no matter how unlikely it sounded—Mikey cared about this relationship? Because he wanted a real relationship? Because he cared about Pete? Because—

“Shut UP!” Mikey groaned, rolling onto his face. 

“Who are you talking to?” Gerard asked.

Mikey hadn’t realized other people had invaded camp while he’d been moping. “You, obviously,” he covered up. 

“I wasn’t even talking!” Gerard objected. 

Mikey screeched in return, burying his face back in his pillow. He was pretty sure he’d sooner puncture the air mattress with his nose than drown out his fucking thoughts. 

Someone unzipped the tent and crawled in bed next to him. Mikey tried to punch that unknown person back out like a whiny little kid, but said person was adamant. 

They ruffled Mikey’s hair and offered him some goldfish crackers. 

“Something wrong, M-Way? Boy trouble?” Lindsey asked. 

“Just sleep deprived. Hike wore me out.” Mikey couldn’t make himself lie to her, not with so much history between them. Instead, he tiptoed around the truth and pretended that was good enough.

“You’re being a real asshole, though. Like more than usual, so I figured something was up.”

Her intentions were honest and kind, but Mikey really wanted to go back to sleep, no questions asked. “Yeah, my dick. Go away, Lindsey.” 

Lindsey crunched on a goldfish slowly and glared at him. Mikey’s face was still pressed in the pillow, but he could feel her stare on the back of his head. And he did feel kinda bad for snapping at her. 

He rolled over and took a handful of goldfish. “Sorry,” he said, crunching. “I didn’t mean to be like that. I’m just trying so fucking hard to un-fuck the fucked up shit I’m involved in and it’s like everything I do is wasted. Completely fucking wasted.”

“Sounds like… a nightmare,” Lindsey looked at him, referencing his meltdown at the Pools. 

“You heard me yell that?” Mikey asked.

“Uh, yeah. I think everyone did. That’s what happens when you yell.”

“Okay, no need to be a dipshit. Pete’s just frustrating.” Again, Mikey was talking to a girl who seemed able to extract the information directly from his expression and he wanted to tell her everything. But he couldn’t. Needless to say, that sucked.

“Cheers to that,” Lindsey took a drink from her water bottle on the table and made a face. She started to laugh once she got it down. “I really was not expecting hard alcohol, but I’m pleasantly surprised.”

She burped and rolled onto her back. “GERARD!”

“WHAT?” he yelled from across the site. 

“WHAT THE FUCK IS IN MY WATER BOTTLE?”

“WHITE CRANBERRY JUICE AND TEQUILA, I THINK!”

“Fucking Frank,” Lindsey grumbled. 

Mikey reached out, but she batted his hand down. “I wouldn’t. It’s nasty.”

“I can do nasty,” Mikey contested.

Lindsey gestured around the tent. “Clearly.”

Mikey snatched the water bottle from her and took a swig. It really wasn’t great. And it didn’t make him feel any better. But after a few sips, he felt loose-lipped enough to tell her what he could without breaking his oath of silence to Pete.

“Wow. He’s a bigger baby than you, the sophomore baby,” Lindsey whistled.

“That’s not news, Lindsey.”

“Oh, shut up. I’m just trying to help while I still can. I really thought you were a lost cause, but with senior year rearing its ugly head, I figured why not try one more time?” Lindsey mocked. 

“I don’t need your help,” Mikey lied. He knew her advice was legendary. It had gotten him out of many a sticky situation. 

“Yeah, but you’re gonna miss it as soon as I’m not around to hand it out. The free sample barn is shutting down pronto, bitch-boy. You’re gonna miss us all soon enough.”

Mikey felt gut-punched. He’d almost forgotten that all of his friends, his brother, and his boyfriend were graduating in less than a year. And he still had another year _after_ that. An invisible hand crushed his heart into more pieces every time he thought about it. It hurt so deeply, that he felt no shame in banishing Lindsey to the lake for even mentioning it. 

“You’re not even sorry, you bastard.” She stared him down while he gloated. “I’ll get you. I’ll gut you like a fish.”

“I’m the kid-brother of every person here. I think collectively they could take you down in my honor.”

“Fine, I’ll dunk myself, but only if you come down there with me. Everyone is down there, we ought to be more social.”

‘Everyone’ meant Pete, and Mikey wasn’t about to apologize for something that wasn’t his fault. ‘Everyone’ also included all of his other friends, who, as Lindsey so kindly reminded him, had limited time left. So Mikey agreed to go, and Lindsey showered them in goldfish in celebration. 

“Thanks for attracting all the raccoons into my tent,” Mikey grumbled, picking up a goldfish from his pillow and eating it. 

Lindsey wasn’t listening. Her eyes had power to them, like she could convince anyone of anything. “Mikey, listen to me. You can’t let him get you down.”

“He’s not,” Mikey explained. The two of exited the tent as he talked. “He’s just acting like I can’t help him, but I can! He’s so frustrating.”

“Maybe because he’s frustrated,” Lindsey offered.

“Why would _he_ be frustrated?”

“Because you’re all up in his business. Listen, you seem to think that being in a relationship means fixing the other person, which tells me that you have no fucking idea how being in a relationship works.”

“Don’t tell me what I think,” grumbled Mikey.

“Then you see why Pete doesn’t want you telling him what to do or how to think. It’s annoying, and whatever’s happening with him is probably amplifying his aggressions.”

“Since when are you a psychic?”

“Since I conceived this universe. I’m older than time itself.” Lindsey looked down at him. She smiled. “Since I discovered that loving someone isn’t fixing them, it’s helping them want to fix themselves.”

Mikey thought on that. He didn’t trust the word “love”, but it suited his purposes. 

“Hey! Heyheyheyheyheyheyhey! Where are you guys going?” Gerard asked, poking only his head out of his tent. 

“The beach, so I can force Lindsey to dunk,” Mikey replied. 

Gerard decided he was invited and pulled on some sandals. “So what are we talking about? Is Mikey still being mean?”

“Always,” Mikey grumbled.

“We’re talking about his problems. He has very many,” Lindsey said, matter of factly. And she began to explain them to Gerard, in stunning detail. 

Mikey zoned out, staring at the tent. It looked stupid without the rain fly, and Mikey was feeling bitchy, so he excused himself for a moment. He put the rain fly back on just to spite Pete, and he was a-okay to go. 

Both Lindsey and Gerard wrapped an arm each around Mikey’s shoulders. He, of course, tried to shrug them off, but they were a lot stronger than he was. Lindsey finally finished explaining to Gerard what she and Mikey had been speaking about. 

“I’m sorry señor asshole is being an asshole. If there’s anything we can do to help, we’re all ears,” Gerard offered.

They walked in silence for a few minutes. Mikey had questions, but he didn’t know how to phrase them until now.

“How do you do it?” he asked apprehensively.

Gerard down looked at him. “Do what?”

“The whole codependence thing.”

“Dating someone?”

“No,” Mikey groaned in frustration. “Just… the feeling like you care about someone so much that you feel like you’re gonna die if anything bad happens to them? How the everloving fuck do you deal with that?”

“Vanilla sex,” Lindsey chimed in.

“Jesus Christ.” 

“Sorry!” she laughed. “I don’t know what to say!”

Mikey looked for a new way to word his thoughts. He hated what he was going to have to say out loud. “You and… Frank…” Mikey gagged on his words just to make Gerard roll his eyes. “You’re just peas in a fucking pod, and you make it look so easy. But everyone has problems, I get that, so how do you not micromanage him all the time?”

Gerard gave him some side-eye. “Did you completely forget what happened the week of prom, or what?”

Just thinking about it made Lindsey cackle with laughter.

“That was a one-time thing and should not be included with the rest of the data,” Mikey concluded.

“Fair.” Gerard bit his nails while he thought. “Mikey, you’ve really just gotta find your own path. Just listen to each other and figure it out.”

“You sure did a hell of a good job listening to Frank when you broke up with him earlier this year,” Mikey grumbled.

Lindsey choked on her laughter and made a snorting noise.

“You said that was exempt from this discussion!” Gerard contested.

“Listen, you made me wear girl clothes to school just so you could get back at Frank for something he didn’t do and I got detention for it, so I think it’s pretty damn relevant.” 

Lindsey was making noises that made Mikey think she was dying.

“When you put it like that…” Gerard snickered. 

Mikey tried to get serious again. “Okay, but Pete won’t talk to me right now. How am I supposed to listen to him if he won’t talk to me?”

“You’re staying in the same tent, he’ll talk eventually.”

“What if he moves to a different tent just to avoid me?”

“Pete eats, breathes, and lives in your name, Mikey. He’ll be back.” Lindsey paused. “And stop being such a worry-wart, or else I’ll sentence you into the lake. Complete saturation or annihilation, you know the rules.”

“God, you all suck. Do either of you know anyone with genuinely good relationship advice?” Mikey groaned.

“Nope,” they said in unison. 

For the rest of the walk Gerard and Lindsey laughed, mostly at each other laughing, and Mikey pretended it wasn’t funny at all. They emerged from the bushes into the beach party, and noticed there was a significant lack of partying happening. Gerard and Lindsey were severely disappointed.

Mikey sat down on a rot rock while Lindsey did her thing, which was to ignite the party. 

She pulled off her shirt. “Wanna know what I’d do?” she asked.

Mikey nodded while he watched Pete attempt to drown Frank in the lake. 

“Give him what he wants.”

“What if what he wants isn’t good for him?”

“That’s your perspective. It’s not about you.” Lindsey shrugged and pulled off her shorts. Clad in a bikini, she five-starred him on the back and leapt off the jumping rock. 

Gerard sat down on the rock next to Mikey and looked on. Lindsey intercepted Pete’s efforts to drown poor Frank, and the two of them went after Pete for retaliation. Mikey rested his head on Gerard’s shoulder and shut his eyes. 

“Enlightened?” Gerard asked, chuckling.

Mikey didn’t answer. He hadn’t seen it coming, but Lindsey’s words helped him out quite a bit. His problems felt clearer. They were still murky water, but sun rays shone through the top layers. 

“No thanks to either of you,” Mikey grumbled, reeling from just how much he was going to miss this once it was over. 

And despite his teenage brain, Mikey said exactly that to Gerard. For a moment it was okay, and that moment was followed by Gerard decreeing that Mikey must also be thrown in the lake, and Mikey contemplating fratricide for not the first time. 

Dinner came around, put on the fast-track by Frank yet again injuring his foot. 

This time he had to be brought to the rangers’ station for medical attention, and the lake was put on the back burner. A couple of Advil and splint later, Frank was mostly fine. Mikey and Frank laughed about it, and Gerard kept yelling at them to take it more seriously. 

“Strong words from the man who’s letting his brother date Pete Wentz. If that’s not a hazard, I dunno what is,” Frank taunted.

“Uh, nobody is _letting_ me do anything. Didn’t you try to fight him?” Mikey hissed. 

“I did fight him, and I won.”

“You definitely did not,” both Mikey and Gerard said. 

“Fake news,” Frank grumbled, shuffling off as fast as he could, on one foot. His makeshift crutch—really only a couple of tent poles with a towel over them—didn’t do too much to ease the pressure off of his foot, and Frank nearly fell again. 

“God, he’s so fucking stupid,” Gerard sighed, jogging forward to go collect him. 

Mikey laughed at their stupidity as he walked on his own. The peace and quiet he could have experience in that state of being alone was squished dead by Lindsey, who apparently teleported to his side the second she sensed he was alone. She and Hayley, who was deserted in favor of Mikey and definitely did not like that, led Mikey to dinner. He didn’t mind it as much as he let on. 

~

“You guys are lucky,” Spencer explained. “I don’t come from a family of cooks; one year, we ate nothing but chili for dinner all week.” 

“Pain is relative,” Ray grumbled, slurping up the remnants of his bowl of chili. He choked on a bean and made peace with death, right then and there. 

“That’s what you get for trying to drink it like soup,” Mikey laughed. 

“Chili _is_ soup,” Gerard combatted. 

“Just because there’s liquid in it, doesn’t mean it’s a soup.”

“I agree, it’s more of a stew,” wheezed Ray, who clearly learned his lesson about treating chili like soup. “Soup wouldn’t do that to me.”

“Chili is a category of its own,” Mikey adamantly defended his position.

“What does that even mean?” Frank asked.

“It’s like s’mores. They’re technically a sandwich, right? But we don’t think of them as sandwiches because they’re sweet.”

“Quick vote, who actually gives a shit?” Spencer asked. 

“You told me a hot dog is a sandwich, you can shut the fuck up,” Mikey snickered.

“A hot dog is a sandwich! It’s meat between two slices of bread! So is a hamburger,” he replied. “And a s’more is obviously not a sandwich.”

“And water isn’t wet, but semantics,” Ray rolled his eyes sarcastically. 

“HOW THE FUCK IS WATER NOT WET?” Frank shouted, standing up and launching his bowl of chili off of his lap.

Mikey did his best not to choke on chili while he laughed. Frank and Ray kept on arguing; there was no chance to get so much as a word in. Pete still hadn’t said anything to Mikey, and he was starting to worry how long this shitshow would be dragged out. In the meantime he was doing a good job keeping himself occupied. Frank liked to argue and he also liked to know he was wrong, which made Ray furious, and Mikey enjoyed watching it, like it was the most vulgar game of ping-pong ever. 

Spencer evidently thought they were too weird— _like he was so high and mighty_ , Mikey thought—and returned to the herd. He was only gone for a few seconds, and came back looking like he was the middle-man in some very unfortunate and unflattering divorce case. He made a half-assed motion at Mikey and pursed his lips, and Mikey realised Spencer was the middle-man in a very unfortunate and unflattering divorce case. His. 

Mikey took his bowl with him because one way or another he was gonna get back to that pot of chili. 

“Are you the shady goon that’s gonna bring me into the forest to meet the boss, who is in this case Pete?” Mikey asked, bored. 

Spencer sighed. “Yeah.” 

Pete was hiding behind a tree, fifteen feet into the forest. “Thank you, Spencer. You can leave.”

“I’m gonna leave this life,” he grumbled, marching back out of the forest. 

Pete waited until Spencer was clear of forest and then some. Silence hung in the air just as the smoke did—heavy, hard to breathe through, uncomfortable. 

“Did you pay him to do that?” Mikey asked. “‘Cause you didn’t pay him enough.”

“I thought you’d appreciate the theatricality.”

Mikey didn’t smile, because he knew Pete was hoping for one. He crossed his arms and noticed Pete had his arms wrapped around himself for support. Okay, lighten up, Mikey told himself. 

“I was worried Spencer made a pact with the cultists to murder me after I told him that hot dogs aren’t sandwiches,” he joked. 

“The fuck? Hot dogs aren’t sandwiches!”

“That’s what I said!” Mikey enthused. 

Pete laughed and for a second, things were okay. Was that the healing process? Smearing jokes over a problem until you couldn’t see it anymore? It was a way, but maybe not the way he wanted to do this. 

“Okay, what did you drag me out here for?” Mikey asked. 

A cloud passed over the sun and the sky turned redder. Mikey didn’t like that omen. 

“I wanted to talk.”

Shockingly, Pete was waiting for Mikey to allow him to continue. Never on God’s green Earth had Mikey seen him do that. It gave him a feeling he didn’t enjoy, like Pete was nervous around him. He didn’t like that at all.

“I’m listening,” Mikey softly replied. 

“Earlier today, I was…” Pete took a deep breath. “Stressed. I was a lot of things, actually, but you probably know all that. When I said all that shit about you being my therapist, I was just feeling crowded, like I had nowhere to think or to cope or to… breathe.” 

Pete could’ve just as easily read out the WebMD list of symptoms for an anxiety attack. 

“You feeling better now?”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m talking it out. That’s what you’re supposed to do, right?” 

It seemed right, but Mikey didn’t know for sure. 

“And I’m sorry I lashed out. I wasn’t even that mad at you, I was mad at my stupid fucking family and all of my problems. I know you were just trying to make me feel better, but there became this pressure to be okay and it was stifling me. I’m hurting all the time and I want to cry it out and punch a wall, but that’s not gonna solve anything. And you were kinda breathing down my neck and it overwhelmed me. I was trapped inside myself with a grenade and you were just the match too close to the fuse. It didn’t really have anything to do with you,” Pete sighed. 

“I did, though. I tried to make it better but it backfired. That’s my fault, you said it yourself.” Mikey uncrossed his arms, feeling weight after weight lifted from his chest. Talking it out felt genuinely good, he realized. 

“It’s just…” Pete paused. “I get what you were going for, I really do. But I like eating garbage 24 hours a day. I’m used to sleeping from 1 am to 7 pm. And if I drink nothing but grape fanta for a month, well, that’s life. It feels normal, and I’m trying to stick to that before all hell breaks loose.”

“I know this is serious, but if I ever catch you drinking grape Fanta, I’m taking you to the hospital because that shit is a biohazard,” Mikey mused. 

Pete laughed but he was really only deflecting. Mikey was too.

He pulled himself together and steadied. “Thanks for telling me this. I’ll always do my best for you, but sometimes I’m really just grasping at straws. I’m still figuring this shit out.”

Pete sniffed. “Me too.”

“And I’m really fucking sorry that I made you feel that way. For the record, I’m not just saying this because you’re struggling, and I’m not glossing over what you said. You were a dick, yes, but I’m just saying that right now you have as good of an excuse as any to be brash. And I swear to God from this moment forward, I’ll do my best to check myself in case I’m in mom-mode. Scout’s honor.” Mikey put his right hand over his heart.

“You weren’t a boy scout, Mikey. You have no honor.”

“My mom is gonna kick your ass for that. She thinks I have honor.”

“I could take your mom,” Pete grinned.

“Full offense, you definitely couldn’t.”

Pete laughed. “Yeah, you’re probably right. Donna Way, ass-kicker extraordinaire.” 

Both of them laughed into the night sky. The red was gone, Mikey noticed. He felt something touch his hand and laced his fingers with Pete’s. As always, Pete’s hands were warm and felt nice to hold in the rapidly cooling evening air. 

“I accept your apology, by the way,” Pete whispered. “And I’m glad we had this whole reconciliation, because I have to tell everyone.”

“Have to?”

“I’d like to avoid another argument because of it. Best to just get it out of the way before it bites me in the ass.”

Mikey could get behind that logic. “So, you want, like, moral support or something?”

Pete looked nervous. “Maybe… I could… run it by you first?”

Mikey shrugged.

“Cool. So, uh, you know my step-brother? Out of college, really tall, kind of my idol? Well, he’s got brain cancer.”

Mikey elbowed Pete, strongly, in the gut.

“Fuck, okay, he’s got something in his brain, so he’s having brain surgery to get it out. It’s probably cancer, not to be nihilistic.”

Even though this was not the first time Mikey had heard the story, it stung. He couldn’t imagine going through that, even though he probably would someday. “When’s the surgery?” he asked quietly.

Pete checked his phone. “T minus nine hours. He’s probably already in the hospital.”

Mikey whistled and rubbed his head. “Sucks, man.”

Pete punched him in the arm. “Way to be sympathetic.”

“That was my best Brendon impersonation. I thought it was on-brand,” Mikey snickered. 

“You’re a sick man.”

Mikey shrugged again. He watched Pete mull it over, weigh his options. He hadn’t noticed the sky darkening, but he could feel the cool breeze of nighttime against his skin. It was a horror movie type wind, and they were in the middle of the forest, alone. Mikey was digging it.

“No matter what you decide to do, tell them, don’t tell them, whatever, I’m gonna go back to the fire soon, because I’m starting to get really worried about those cultists eating me,” Mikey said. Just as he spoke, a howl of a wind rose, rattling leaves off of trees and the dust off the ground.

Pete caught his eyes, glittering black in the twilight. They had a moment of silent communication as the moon rose behind them, blurred by days-old smoke. There was a time when Mikey never considered kissing Pete out of blue. Now he couldn’t imagine _not_ kissing him. When Mikey leaned in and felt Pete smile against him, he knew those days were never coming back. Something had changed. He didn’t know when, he didn’t know why, or how. But he was glad it had. 

He pulled back to articulate that, but his words failed him. Pete started to get concerned when Mikey just stood there, looking wet-lipped and haunted. For just a second, Mikey had a coherent thought, but he couldn’t get it out before something rustled the brush behind him. 

They turned around, but, surprise, surprise, nothing was there. Mikey got chills down his spine. The horror movie vibe wasn’t so cool anymore. 

“Hey, not to rush things, ‘cause I know we’re having a moment here, but I’m really not looking to get murdered tonight,” Pete snickered nervously.

“The moment’s over now, that’s for sure. Let’s go get some s’mores,” Mikey replied.

~

After copious amounts of s’mores, Pete found the courage to explain everything to his friends. Mikey sat next to him, holding his cup while he spoke. Looking around at all the faces of people hearing the story for the first time, Mikey understood why Pete was hesitant. Intentional or not, so much pity poured out that Mikey himself felt kinda babied. 

But Pete made it very clear how he wanted to be treated and people seemed to respect that. Some didn’t appear likely to even remember Pete’s story in the morning. And then the explanation ended, and Andy pulled out the rest of the craft brews, and people moved on. Sorta inspirational, Mikey thought. 

He would’ve loved to stay out all night, but he felt barbequed and drained. His skin and all his clothes smelled like smoke. His brain was filled with fluff. His emotions were high-strung, but he was very much on low-battery. In another hour, he was leaving for bed. Even though Pete didn’t have to—he said it himself—Pete went with him. 

“Who put the rain fly back up?” he asked, unzipping the tent.

“Me.”

“I thought Spencer said it wasn’t going to rain.”

“How funny will it be if it rains and Spencer gets soaked and we don’t? Plus, I just wanted to spite you,” Mikey argued. 

“How very passive-aggressive of you,” Pete yawned. 

“Yeah,” Mikey mumbled, caught in his sweatshirt. “I’m kinda known for that.”

Pete helped him out and flopped back on the slowly deflating air mattress. “I can’t see the stars now.”

Mikey groaned, “do you really want me to take it off that badly?”

Pete rolled onto his side and Mikey knew what he was going to say the second they made eye contact. 

“Nah. I’ve got you. You’re a star.”

Mikey rolled his eyes. “You’re a black hole. Shut up,” he added, using insults to cover up his blush. 

Mikey handed his glasses to Pete who set them safely on the ground away from the bed. Only while slipping into bed did Mikey truly relax for, as he realized, the first time in months. And with that feeling came a sigh and the need for closeness. He pulled Pete in by the back of his neck and just laid there. 

Pete tapped him. “What were you gonna say? Earlier, when we were in the woods, and that mysterious rustling interrupted you.”

_Interrupted what? My incoherent train of thought?_ Mikey wondered. “I don’t know.” Soon as he uttered those words, Mikey began to know. 

“I just have way too many emotions to deal with. It occured to me that… I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

“Shit,” Pete laughed. He fucking _laughed_ , Mikey thought. He’d expected Pete to clam up. “Me neither.”

Mikey looked back at the ceiling. So neither of them knew what they were doing. That made it a little bit better. It made the uncertainty, the “what if I fuck up?” feeling, and the fear tone it down a smidge. Enough for him to say, “I want to figure it out, though.”

Pete looked at him. “Me too, Mikes.”

Internally screaming, Mikey blinked back all of his emotions that were about to come pouring out. Pete took his hand and laced their fingers. Mikey watched him kiss their hands and stretch out under the covers.

Whatever was on his mind got erased as footsteps and voices entered the camp. The two of them listened to their friends drunkenly get ready for bed. Lights clicked out from the other two tents, and then site eighteen was left in darkness and relative quiet. 

“You gonna be able to fall asleep?” Mikey asked quietly, squeezing Pete’s hand. 

Mikey looked over when Pete didn’t reply. Pete snored into the pillowcase, and Mikey decided to let the conversation end there. He had nothing left to say, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please comment if you enjoyed


	5. Hahaha, Ryan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ryan is just tripping balls the entire goddamn time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please lemme know if u liked it, peepee the cat died for this

Ryan hadn’t been sober in four days. He’d been living the rockstar life—drinking, smoking, and sucking dick (generally considered to be the three best things in life). Except, he was in the woods, which was a strange place to live such a rockous life. As for the rest of the time, it was a fog. The “rest of the time” just meant the gaps in between being high and getting higher, and those were just commercials between scenes. The trip felt like a week-long mental, physical, and emotional orgasm. He didn’t even care how weird that sounded. 

The best moments, though, were when he was the closest to sober, first thing in the morning. When his bed was warm, and Brendon was splayed out across the _entire_ tent, and the world outside felt empty. They were just cats under cars in the rain. It had been drizzling for the past eon. 

Ryan fondly remembered hearing Spencer shrieking when the first heavy drops fell. Ryan assumed he of all people wouldn’t take the rainfly off, but no; critical thinking had failed Spencer yet again. Nothing made Ryan smile like his best friend being a dumbass. 

Bored, Ryan wrestled Brendon out of the blankets strangling him and pulled him onto his chest. Whether or not Brendon woke up, Ryan was content. It would be a lazy morning. He was all about lazy mornings. 

Drops of rain splattered on the tent’s roof. Water collected on top until it overflowed down the side like wax spilling down the side of a taper. Ryan watched patterns form on the walls. He listened to the wind, to far off boots on far off pavement, and to Brendon’s quiet breathing. He reached his hand not petting Brendon’s hair into the free air to feel the temperature change. Woah. Chilly. 

He put his cold hand back into the sleeping bag. The sudden cold didn’t bother Brendon, who was, as always, sleeping like the dead. Ryan had been conducting experiments for a while, trying to see what exactly could wake him up. The results? Not a lot. 

But Ryan liked waking up first. It gave him some time to prepare for hurricane Brendon. He liked thinking in that early morning way, where common sense was not feasible. It gave him a new perspective. Currently, that meant Ryan felt sorta like a plant. He felt rooted to the earth, where he revelled in soft top-soil and assorted worms. Did that make Brendon a worm? Ryan ran a few fingers through Brendon’s hair. No. Too soft to be a worm. 

He laughed softly to himself. Nothing made any sense to him. Ryan had maybe three brain cells and at the moment, and none of them were operational. Life was perfect. Something of a reminder trickled into his mind, that his friends would probably all think he was nuts for being so utterly decimated so early in the morning. Ryan wasn’t in a judgy mood, so he brushed it off. Who cared what they thought? 

Ryan didn’t need anybody to give their opinions about his mood. Dallon got all paranoid that they’d be caught doing drugs, but Ryan wasn’t sure if Dallon counted as a friend, so that negated everything. And God forbid someone like Mikey weigh in, because Mikey didn’t “believe in love”, and Ryan couldn’t fathom thinking something like that. How could he? It was hard to disbelieve in something he was so deep in. 

The rain fly reverberated with denser droplets. A gust of humid wind blew through the tent, brushing the hair out Ryan’s eyes. The brightness burned them, and all of the sudden, there was a drumming in his head. A thunder clap shook his whole body. For a second he worried about the tent getting struck by lightning, but he realized the sound was just his own headache shifting into gear. 

As much as it pained him to do so, Ryan slid Brendon off of him. Advil was the priority, and he practically inhaled it. He sat there for a second, trying to regain any of his bearings, but he still felt hazy. Slowly he reclined and shut his eyes again. It wasn’t like he had anywhere to be; he could take his time waking up. 

Brendon sighed in his sleep and rolled onto his face. 

Ryan smiled a little and put a hand on his back. He felt Brendon unconsciously arch his back toward the touch. Ryan dragged his fingers up his back, over his neck, and rested them on his cheek. Reflecting the little light around them, Brendon’s eyes opened. They echoed the colors of the forest and, while hazy, radiated brightness. 

Ryan nearly choked on his own voice. “Morning,” he whispered.

Brendon grumbled and coughed up the sleep in his throat. “Are you sure it is? Kinda dim.” He reached around himself for the bong. 

_Priorities_ , Ryan mused to himself. He wrapped an arm around Brendon’s chest and pulled him back down. They held each other there, bodies pressed together, creating heat. Brendon’s breath was a calm breeze against Ryan’s neck as his eyelashes fluttered shut again. 

“This is heaven,” muttered Brendon. The vibrations from his voice reverberated through Ryan’s skin, reaching every nerve in his body, and sent tingles through all of them. 

“Yeah,” Ryan agreed, speaking through his teeth. He didn’t know what the hell Brendon had just done, but he wanted it to happen again. 

“I was so stupid, Ry,” Brendon mumbled. “We could’ve had this sooner.” He wasn’t supposed to talk about that, and he knew it. 

Ryan had bad memories from the week they finally got together and prior to. Nearly a year before they kissed at prom, Ryan had told Brendon about his feelings, and Brendon hadn’t exactly… reciprocated them. Up until the day of prom itself, Brendon hadn’t realized that he cared about Ryan in ways that “best friends” don’t. Even immediately following Brendon kissing him in the middle of the dance floor, Ryan had reservations. He didn’t mean to be mean, but Brendon’s relationship with dating was not great. Ryan hadn’t wanted to be one-and-done. As evident, he hadn’t been.

Most of the ill feelings disappeared over time. He still got anxious now and then, when Brendon spoke about the awkward stage between the confession and prom. They tried actively to avoid the subject. 

But to Brendon, this was as golden an opportunity to repent as any, and he was practically counting the seconds until he could sink to his knees to ‘pray’.

Ryan pat his back absentmindedly, staring up at the wet top of the tent. “I’m that comfortable, huh?” he snickered softly. 

In reply, Brendon pressed his lips onto Ryan’s neck and bit him gently, just hard enough leave a mark that would last a little while. He wanted to see it later, by the lake, knowing he put it there. Going even further, he wanted to drag Ryan to an obsolete corner of the campground and focus his energy on it. He wanted to use his lips and only his lips to force out those little groans Ryan made when he was almost there. But that was for later. Brendon settled back down and sighed, “It’s too early for weed, right?”

Ryan’s response was automatic. “It’s happy hour somewhere.”

“Well, if you insist—” Brendon sat up and reached for his instrument of chaos. He didn’t care about the smell, or nonsensical backhand looks from their friends. This week wasn’t about Spencer’s forest breathing therapy, it was ‘we’ time for Brendon and Ryan. Or as Brendon had coined it, “weed time”. 

Equally interested but much lazier, Ryan pulled him back down. Bare skin crashed on bare skin and Brendon laughed quietly. 

“Hey, you’re the enabler here.”

Ryan reached up and dragged Brendon down by the face. He tasted like shitty beer, but that was the farthest thing from Ryan’s train of thought. He knotted his fingers in Brendon’s hair and pulled him in so tightly, neither of them could breathe. Sharp pain emanated from the spots on his skin where Brendon dug his nails. Slowly, Ryan’s hands slid down Brendon’s body. Lower and lower, until Ryan broke the kiss to laugh.

“You’re not wearing any pants.”

Brendon kissed him and smiled into it. “Yeah,” he broke away, saying, ”not sure when or how that happened. I hope I didn’t go streaking at midnight.”

“Again,” Ryan laughed.

“Yeah, again,” Brendon agreed.

With this new information, Ryan went back to kissing his neck and enjoying the soft, whiny noises he made. He made Brendon grab hold of him by running his tongue along his jawline. Ryan felt like he was sealing an envelope, but Brendon liked it, so whatever. 

“God, you’re such a bottom,” Ryan teased, clasping his hand around Brendon’s neck.

Brendon laughed, pretending he wasn’t enjoying it. “Shut up, bitch.” He sat up and pinned Ryan down forcefully. “BRING ME THE STRAP-ON!” he shouted.

“Brendon, you have a dick.”

“Oh, yeah.”

There was a beat of silence, and from the outside came the sound of someone clearing their throat. “Um… g’morning, you guys,” Spencer murmured. 

Ryan twisted out of Brendon’s grasp and unzipped the tent enough to poke his head through. He saw Spencer standing uncomfortably in the middle of the camp ground, not even a cup of coffee in his hands. _Hell of a way to wake up_ , Ryan thought to himself. 

“And good morning to you, too.” Ryan smiled through the embarrassment. 

Spencer gave him a thumbs up and walked away. 

“You think he’s regretting inviting us yet?” Brendon asked, stretching out his limbs. His entire upper body was polka-dotted with love bites. To Ryan he looked like some kind of poisonous frog.

“I think he regretted it the moment he invited us.”

Brendon sighed and laid back down. “That’s what friends are for.” Being as needy as he was, he reached out for Ryan to come closer, and pulled him back under the covers. Ryan looked at him with questioning eyes, but Brendon said nothing. 

“You’re making the face,” Ryan observed.

“What face?”

“The face you make when you want to be kissed. You pucker your lips and stare like your eyes are out of focus.” It was one of Ryan’s favourite things about Brendon, but he’d never told him that. “It’s cute.”

“If I’m making the face, you should probably kiss me. Be a gentleman, Ry.”

Ryan was about to, when somebody just couldn’t give them more than five minutes of privacy. 

Spencer tapped the tent. “Hey, guys? You want breakfast soon? ‘Cause Dal’ and I are awake because our stuff got rained on and—”

Ryan ripped open the side of the tent, sending droplets of cold water onto his and Brendon’s nearly naked bodies. It felt positively not great, and Ryan no longer wished to be a plant. Spencer got the whole view though, and he looked like he wished he’d stayed in bed.

“Could you maybe not be a voyeur, please?” Brendon complained, still completely splayed out on the bed, half covered in a sleeping bag or two. 

“Y—uh, sorry. I was just wondering… y’know. Breakfast.” Spencer turned his back and waited for a reply.

The two in the tent stared at each other for a moment, as if deciding whether food really took precedence over their current situation. Finally, Ryan pulled himself off of Brendon and reached for a shirt. 

“Isn’t it raining?” he asked. The effects of last night’s party were once again on blast. Whenever the fun stopped, they kicked in, and Spencer and his shitty oatmeal were really, tremendously less fun than tent-time with Brendon. 

“It stopped a little while ago. Out on the lake there’s no rain, so I just assumed that the trees were dripping.”

Brendon paused, midway through putting on a shoe. “On the lake, you say? Why were you on the lake?”

“I took Andy’s sailboat out earlier this morning. It’s almost nine o’clock, you know.” Spencer took a look at them, hungover and smelling of day-old weed, and reconsidered his tone. “But we’re on vacation, so it doesn’t matter.” 

“Is anyone on the boat right now?” Brendon asked. 

“Nope.”

“Oh, baby,” Brendon rubbed his hands together. “I’ve got a fuckin’ _stellar_ idea.”

~

What a grey morning it was. While Spencer was correct, the rain had stopped, it was no closer to warm and sunny than it had been overnight. The lake’s green color was gone, and now mirrored the grey above. An ever-so-often occuring breeze helped the boat drift here and there, but it kept blowing Brendon’s joint out. 

“Fuck it, I don’t even care anymore,” he sulked, passing it to Ryan, who was _trying_ to eat his oatmeal without vomiting it back over the side of the boat. He passed it on to Spencer and leaned back. 

Unsurprisingly, the lake was quiet. The surrounding area of the lake and the bowl it sat in was quiet. Hell, the whole world felt quiet. The only murmur around him was the sloshing of the waves and the effervescent chatter from his friends. Without noticing, Ryan dipped his fingertips into the water, letting the coolness rejuvenate him. He needed all the help he could get, between his hangover and the seasickness, which was probably also partly due to the hangover. 

As nauseating as the rocking of the boat made him, Ryan began to enjoy the moment, minus the oatmeal. Not only was the buzz kicking in, but Spencer and Dallon were loosening up, which made them so much more bearable. Spencer was 100% Ryan’s best friend, but he was a bit much at nine in the morning. 

The wind wrapped around Ryan’s bare skin and his eyes fell out of focus. He was a piece of driftwood in the time continuum. The world around him was moving slower than usual, and he felt like he only saw every third frame. So slow and weary, but insurmountably happy. He loved feeling like this. 

The breath coming in and out of his lungs felt perfect against his throat, almost like a sweetness. His eyelids drooped and fought for every inch they could gain; Ryan couldn’t see the mountains in the distance anymore. The blood in his body moved like ants on a log, making his skin hotter and the breeze feel sharper.

Lost in thought, Ryan nearly missed Spencer pass the joint to Dallon, something never in a million years did Ryan think he would witness. Even better, Dallon didn’t choke to death after taking a hit. _So, he’d done this before_ , Ryan hypothesized. That opened up a new can of worms. 

“Jesus, Dallon, when did you become such a druggie? Get your life together!” Brendon baited. 

Dallon gave him a mom glare. “Stop projecting your problems onto me.”

Ryan cackled out loud. Every time Brendon got viciously ripped to shreds by Dallon, Ryan’s respect for him grew a little more. So much so, that Ryan gave Dallon a whole high-five; Brendon held his face in his hands, contemplating how to rebuke that. 

“Wow, I didn’t even think you two liked each other,” Spencer announced, eyes flipping back and forth between Ryan and Dallon. 

Not that Ryan had thought about it, but the high five was a little weird. He didn’t really like Dallon, if he was being honest. It was very much personal, but he had his reasons. 

Dallon shrugged. “I don’t dislike Ryan.”

It was probably the weed, but something urged Ryan to respond. “It’s just strange. I mean, he—” Ryan gestured to Dallon. “—fucked my boyfriend. Before we got together, but still.” 

Dallon choked on his orange juice. “NO—” he coughed out. “No, I did not. We went out, ONCE. Did he tell you I fucked him?”

Brendon buried his nose in his water bottle when Ryan tried to glare the answer out of him. “I may have said something along those lines, but I was just trying to make Ry jealous.” 

Dallon wrapped his arms around himself defensively. “Well, if Brendon told you that, then I have the authority to tell you about a little dream that he may or may not have had.”

Brendon whipped his head up, staring daggers at Dallon. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It was so painfully obvious he did. 

“That’s cute,” Dallon hissed. “But no, I really think I remember you telling me something or other about a dream, featuring myself and Ryan. Yep, now I’m totally sure. It’s returning like war flashbacks.”

Ryan leaned forward, barely holding back his hysteria. “Please, please tell us more.”

“NO, I REALLY THINK IT’S OKAY! WE CAN STOP THERE! I’VE BEEN MORTIFIED ENOUGH!” 

“Ironically, you’ve become such a prude since you started sucking dick like your life depended on it. The old Brendon would’ve told the story himself,” Spencer scoffed. Ryan couldn’t be sure, but that sounded an awful lot like a challenge, and Brendon never turned down one of those. 

Brendon narrowed his eyes at Spencer. “You wanna know that bad? Fine, add this to your spank-bank. I had a dream that—”

Brendon’s words were the roller coaster going nine-hundred miles per hour and Ryan was the kid in the front seat whose harness wouldn’t buckle. His entire world expanded as Brendon regaled his dream in vivid detail. Buzzed Ryan was in this weird place where he _knew_ that this was going to ruin his life, but some part of him enjoyed it immensely. By the end, everyone on the boat was redder than the dawn. 

“I never considered Ryan and Dallon, but now that you’ve brought it up, I kinda wanna see it,” Spencer whispered. Dallon stuck his tongue out at Spencer.

“I know, right!” Brendon hissed. 

Ryan whacked him on the arm. “You’re gonna regret saying that the next time we all decide to play ‘tell awful stories about Brendon’,” he hissed. The only thing Ryan was really mad at was the fact that he kind of wanted to see it too. 

“I mean,” Dallon piped up. He rolled his head around a few times, smiling stupidly. If Ryan thought the boat was swaying, then Dallon was in orbit. “It would be kinda funny if we kissed or something. See how Brendon likes it then.” 

Ryan couldn’t believe his ears. So much for his perception of Dallon, which, over the course of their boat adventure, had been shot and beaten and then shot again. Worse, was that Ryan couldn’t stop himself from agreeing. Pissing Brendon off was always a temptation of biblical proportions. 

The two of them fell in together without so much as verbal consent, and Ryan’s expectations, to be perfectly honest, were completely exceeded. Dallon held him by the back of the neck, fingertips digging into the bruises Brendon had made. Warmth poured out of his body, warmth created by so much contact and also so much confusion. He felt himself bite Dallon’s lower lip. A small whine exited from Dallon in return, and that was the exact moment that Spencer decided enough was enough.

“OKAY!” he yelped, pulling Dallon off of Ryan by the hem of his shirt. “I think we’ve been traumatized enough.”

Ryan wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “Hope you don’t have mono.”

“Why the fuck would I have mono?” Dallon exclaimed.

Ryan shrugged. “I dunno, Spencer’s kinda a diseased rat sometimes. You know how it is.”

“Bitch, I will cut you,” Spencer threatened, messing with the rigging of the boat he knew nothing about. 

Ryan sat back down next to Brendon, who had been suspiciously quiet for a long time. “Satisfied?” he asked.

Brendon crossed his legs and pursed his lips. After a moment of hazy deliberation he whispered to Ryan. “When we get off this boat, we’re going back to the tent, and you’re going to fuck—”

“HEY!” yelled a person on the shore. 

Ryan could barely see the figure from so far out, but it was either a four-year old or Frank. And he hadn’t yet seen any four-year olds with neck tats. 

Brendon almost capsized the boat by standing on the prow and hollering at the shore. “AHOY, TINY PIRATE!”

Ryan pulled him down, centered on his lap. 

“WHAT’S GOING ON OUT THERE? CUZ I SWEAR I JUST SAW—”

“YEAH, CONSENSUAL CHEATING!” hollered Spencer. He aggressively patted Dallon on the back, who suddenly looked less than pleased to have done such a thing. 

The sails filled with wind, pushing the small boat toward the shore. Spencer stood proudly, holding onto loose ropes, even though he’d done absolutely nothing. 

Frank waited patiently by the shore until they’d come to a very full and complete stop, by crashing into the bank. The jolt threw Brendon off Ryan’s lap.

From the bottom of the boat, he asked, “so, what’s a small child doing alone this early in the morning?”

“Chopping your dick off,” Frank growled. 

“Shiver me timbers,” Brendon mumbled.

Frank cut him off, no longer caring what he said, “there was a reason I came to get y’all actually, but I can’t remember. How was the voyage?”

“Arrrrrr, the waves were—”

“OH YEAH!” Frank interrupted again. “I remember now. Yeah, Lindsey’s missing.”

A silence followed. 

“Am… am I supposed to be happy about that?” Spencer asked nervously, once an appropriate amount of silence had elapsed.

“No, dipshit!” Frank punched him in the arm. “Either she was kidnapped, or she’s wandering the camp alone, probably sleepwalking, OR, and this is my personal suggestion, she’s beating the fuck out of the rednecks.”

A chainsaw roared in the distance. Several birds in the area burst into the skies. Black birds on early skies, eerie as all hell. Ryan was a sucker for a good murder mystery, but he really hoped Lindsey wasn’t dead. He was at a metaphorical fork in the road. 

Amidst his thoughts, he missed the search party launch, and was left to dock the boat with Dallon. Neither of them knew the slightest about boating, so Ryan rolled up his pants and pushed the boat through the shallows to the dock.

He haphazardly threw the ropes together in some sort of knot and hiked himself out of the water. He helped Dallon gather the dishes out of the boat, and with his shoes tucked under his arm, the two of them walked away. 

They paused at the fork between the two halves of the campground. 

“Hey,” Dallon said, peering down the forbidden road. “Wanna go the long way?”

The air was beginning to heat up and the dirt path was not so bad on his bare feet, so Ryan agreed. All the colors of the trees and the sky and the parked cars blended together into a watercolor painting he could live in. The wind blew his bastard of a bowl cut out of his eyes. Ryan felt like the main character in a Ghibli film.

The other side of camp was definitely darker, in that it had more trees. Camper vans and trucks drenched the two of them in shadows. Every so often the roar of the chainsaw would spark up from far away. It was such a faint sound that Ryan couldn’t be sure he wasn’t imagining it.

“And they say we’re not adventurous,” he whispered, voice mingling with the gentle gusts of wind brushing past his face. 

“We made out this morning! I dare say we’re plenty adventurous.”

_‘Dare say’?_ Ryan gave him a look, unsure if he was speaking like that because he was high, or if he always did that and Ryan tuned him out. He smiled in absence of words. Dallon was a strange one; Ryan was starting to like that. 

“Yeah,” he agreed. “They don’t know us at all.” He got the feeling that today was a day of reconciliation and new forged pathways, and Dallon was a good place to start. 

Dallon scoffed. “You don’t know the half of it. I’ve got this reputation of being a pure little Mormon boy that everyone wants to turn into some leather-clad asshole, but I’m not either of those things. I’m just me, and y’know…” 

Ryan nudged him. “You can tell me, it’s okay. I won’t tell a soul, unlike some people.” _Like Brendon._

Dallon smiled briefly. “Sometimes it just feels like nobody wants me to be me. Just my stereotypes.” He paused a moment. “And by now I’m just scared that nobody will like the real me.”

“If it’s any consolation, in the span of, like, half an hour, I’ve gone from disliking you, to being mildly indifferent, to definitely liking you.”

“Really? I thought it was at least going to take a blowjob.”

Ryan shot him a look.

“See? I’m joking, obviously, but because it came from me… I don’t know. You get what I’m saying, right?”

“Yeah, I do. I guess just be you, and if anyone gives you shit, I’ll put poison oak in their sleeping bag or something. Nobody would suspect me.”

Dallon laughed into the crisp air. “I guess you’ve got your own stereotypes too, then.”

“Sure, everybody does. But I use mine for gain.”

“I bet everyone tells you their deepest darkest fears,” Dallon sniffled. 

“Not exactly. But apparently I’m a pretty good shoulder to cry on. And, like I mentioned, nobody is gonna suspect me and my scarves of putting poison oak in some poor soul’s tent.”

Dallon laughed again. “You’re weirdly good at this. Even though you only started liking me today.”

“Listen,” Ryan snickered. “Everyone has their thing. Pete’s an asshole, Gerard can’t swim, Jon has a girlfriend, but nobody knows for some reason, Bob is also an asshole and—” Ryan paused. 

“What?”

“I know where Lindsey is. I bet she went to get her buddies and drive them up for the last few days. Man, the fire tonight is gonna be chaotic as fuck.”

“Should we go tell everyone at camp? I don’t want them to call the forest police or anything.” Dallon asked.

“If they can’t figure this out on their own, they don’t deserve us.”

Dallon cocked his head and began to grin. “Damn right.”

~

“Please be gentle,” Ryan whispered.

Brendon leaned closer and ran his thumb across Ryan’s cheekbone. “Why? Sore already?”

“Fuck you, I sunburn easily. I’m already pink from the boat this morning, and it was overcast!” Ryan took the sunblock away from Brendon and drowned himself in it. 

“You look like a mime,” Brendon laughed.

“You’re about to look dead, so watch yourself,” Ryan replied, rubbing his face madly. 

Another day, another hike. This one was all thanks to Pete, whom yesterday had suggested they go look for cannibals or cultists or whatever the fuck in the woods. Spencer, someone who definitely expected to be murdered, decided yes, that was a wonderful idea. And thus, the whole party saddled up at site 18, filling bottles with water, bags with lunches, and hearts with resentment toward Spencer.

“How long is this hike, Spencer?” spat Gerard. 

“Slightly shorter,” Spencer replied, tying a bandana around Jon’s forehead. 

Gerard ruffled Spencer’s hair. “That’s the right answer.” 

Ryan wasn’t sure if he meant to be menacing, because he indeed accomplished it. “If somebody were to murder Spencer during this trip, who do you think it would be?”

“Me,” Brendon replied.

Ryan rubbed his excess sunscreen on Brendon’s face. “I figured you’d say that. I think it’d be Gerard.”

“Just because?”

“Yeah. Mikey’s really into death too, so maybe it’s a Way thing.” Ryan paused to rub in a spot of sunscreen on Brendon’s face. “Speaking of Mikey, props to him for whatever he said to Pete. He’s practically glowing today.”

Pete was, at that very moment, on top of the bear box, punting small rocks into the abyss of the forest. Patrick was trying to drag him off and narrowly avoiding getting himself punted in the face. 

“I really hope he’s doing okay,” Ryan muttered. He’d known Pete for a long time; people found that unusual, and Ryan couldn’t fathom why. Hell, he’d been part of the reason Pete transferred to East High after he got “asked to leave” his old school. 

“Aww, that’s so kind of you,” Brendon cooed. 

Ryan rolled his eyes. “I have human emotions, Brendon.”

“ALL RIGHT, CAMPERS! FOLLOW ME!” howled Spencer, leading his disgruntled troops toward the trailhead. 

Brendon kissed Ryan briefly before bounding off to walk with Dallon and Spencer. Ryan almost followed, but decided maybe a little break from the three of them wouldn’t be so bad. He ended up caught between Gerard and Jon, an unexpectedly enjoyable group. 

“Any chance either of you wanna share this with me?” Ryan asked, pulling out an edible.

“Oh fuck yes I do,” Gerard hissed. “If I have to stand through one more hiking speech from Spencer I swear to God I’m gonna blow my brains out.”

Jon shrugged. “Might as well. It’s been a minute since I’ve done this.”

So Ryan split the rice krispie into three parts. This ended up being problematic in a multitude of ways. Firstly, the calories gave all three of them side stitches. The hike was short enough that they didn’t suffer for long, but Gerard did in fact have to sit through another God damn speech, because the edibles hadn’t had time to kick in yet.

Ryan didn’t want to be a downer, but after Emerald Pools the day before, Secret Lake kinda sucked. There was no bank to wade in on, only large rocks that dropped drastically down into two foot deep water. And before the rocks were swaths of thick greenery occluding a non-existent shore. A trail, overgrown and dusty, looped the lake narrowly, but even after scouring every corner of the lake, no good lunching spot was procured. 

Spencer was in a bit of a huff. He put his hands on his lips and sighed deeply. “Pete! Any ideas?” _Oh, great,_ Ryan thought, _because Pete had so many good ones._

Pete shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand as he looked around. He pointed to a large rock next to the least rocky bit of the shore. “How about up there?”

“Perfect!” 

Nobody cared enough to argue, so they marched up the rock and stayed there. 

For the first time since Spencer had mentioned it, Ryan swore there was company in the woods around him. In the way the water rippled from bubbles that nothing made. Or how the wind howled with voices that never sung in the city. He knew there were coyotes around, probably worse too, but he’d take that over what he felt now. Disembodied eyes littered all of the places he couldn’t see. The air was spotless, like it wasn’t even there. Every breath lifted him up into the air; he didn’t want to go where he was being taken. It didn’t take much to imagine his corpse slumped against a log until he decomposed completely.

“Fuck,” he muttered to himself, grabbing his sides before the invisible hands could snatch him away. 

“What’s wrong?” asked Gerard. 

Ryan whipped around. Surely a second ago he’d been alone. There’d been no footsteps, no noise, just him and the spirits of the forest. Watching, as they always did. Breath picking up, Ryan made uneasy eye contact with Gerard.

Coupled with a concerned expression, Gerard’s eyes were red like morning skies. 

_Oh, yeah_ , Ryan thought. He was high as a motherfucking kite. “Nothing, I’m good. Just paranoia.”

Gerard scooted himself closer to Ryan and continued eating. As the minutes passed—either flashing past like Gerard was a remote on fast forward, or struggling to move from one to the next—Gerard’s eyes grew redder and he began to unfuse with reality. 

“Why’s the party so lame today? I thought we wanted to go to the haunted ass lake and get eaten by forest people!” Spencer complained, through a mouth of lettuce.

“Have you looked around?” Pete replied with his own question, gesturing around at the inhospitable environment enclosing the group.

“Not to mention Ryan is tripping so hard he’s about to faceplant sitting down,” Meagan snickered. 

Ryan, hearing his name only vaguely, looked around. He saw Meagan barely holding onto her composure and uttered a, “What?”

She cackled violently and gestured a ‘never mind’ to him. “If you’re so bored, Spencer, go find us those omens you discovered last time you were here.”

“There’s no way I’ll find them. That was at least four years ago, and I have not been back since. Unlike some people here, I don’t actively seek out death. And those little figurines were definitely gonna invoke some eldritch horror to come and melt my flesh,” he said. “Pete was the one who wanted to hear a scary story. He should go search for them himself.”

“Why did you even offer to take us here if you’re so sure we’re gonna meet our ends?” Meagan scrutinized. 

“There’s a couple of you I wouldn’t mind going away quietly.”

“Nice,” Frank grinned. “I hereby authorize a search party for ‘eldritch horrors’. Cowards not welcome.” Frank launched himself off the rock and into the forest. 

About who Ryan had expected hopped up to join the quest. Pete’s fake walkie-talkie conversations echoed all around forest as they explored. 

“Us cowards are gonna have to fend for ourselves, I guess,” Hayley muttered whimsically. “I don’t have any cards or anything—” A breeze blew, stripping trees of dead leaves and delivering them onto laps. 

Ryan watched in fear as a queen of hearts landed face up next to Hayley. More and more dropped from the sky, like clay pigeons. They cut Ryan’s face as they fell, little nails undoing his knotted skin. There were no more hoots and hollers from the surrounding area, only an all consuming silence and the heavy breathing of his friends. 

Gerard reached for Ryan, and the moment their bare skin touched, when blood met blood, detoured only by double layer or skin, Ryan leaped practically a foot in the air. Gerard wasn’t looking to shake him out whatever he was having, but had that effect anyway.

Even with the voices and the warmth and the leaves back, one lone card still sat in the middle of the broken circle. It flickered with the gusts of wind and then disappeared, swept back up by the breeze. 

“Holy shit, you guys saw that too, right?” Jon asked. “That just happened, that, that card appearing right after— holy shit.”

Ryan wasn’t sure what he was seeing anymore. He was completely scared shit-less, but he knew this was gonna make one hell of a story. If he remembered it tomorrow. He laughed, a laugh without anything funny prompting it. “We’re… we’re pissing ourselves over a fucking card. This is— this is actually happening right now? Wow, we are the cowards.”

“This wouldn’t be so scary if you four weren’t high right now!” Hayley accused. “Then I’d have some decent back up, should a ghoul appear!”

“Four?” asked Dallon, now perfectly sober and offended Hayley thought otherwise.

“I’m decent back up!” complained Meagan. Three seconds later, she fell backwards off the tall end of the rock. She landed with a thud and an “oof!”. 

The very sound made Ryan’s vision spin. His head felt fine but black spots appeared in his vision. Somebody was burning the 8-millimeter running between his thoughts and his eyes. 

A voice from very, very far away cried out, “hey, guys! Let’s swim!”

Ryan came-to an unknown amount of time later, sitting on a rock with his shoes off and his feet in the water. Hayley was a meter or so from him, pants hiked up her thighs. Was she saying something? Her mouth was moving, Ryan was fairly sure, but she could’ve been chewing. 

His body was an 8,000 year old dinosaur skeleton and he was just Night at the Museum-ing the shit out of it. Turning like a rusty-ass crane, he peered around behind him. 

The cowards waded around the shallows, which were not all that shallow. The rest of the group had returned from the scavenger hunt, now peacefully chatting and chowing down on lunches upon the rock. He caught Brendon’s eye and received a wave as payment for his hard work. Ryan squinted through the sunlight, unable to see because of Brendon’s now deafening laughter. 

He pointed at Ryan and the group turned to marvel the creature waking up from hibernation. 

Ryan didn’t like that very much and turned back around to observe his knees. They were not very interesting, but it trumped being a zoo animal. He focused now on the water lapping against his ankles. Were those… fish? Minnows, maybe, swimming around his feet? Yes? Yes? No, minnows had fins. Those were not minnows. 

One of them wiggled over to his foot and latched on. _A stowaway!_ Ryan thought to himself. That was pretty funny! 

“Ouch,” Ryan muttered. That thing latched on pretty tight! He still thought it was pretty funny. Another spark of pain shot up from his foot. Okay, the thing was not being funny anymore. Ryan leaned over and picked it off. The little thing put up a hell of a fight, but Ryan scooped it up and flung it back into the lake.

Ryan, proud of himself, was starting to hear more sounds now, and got distracted for a little bit. When he looked back down, the thing had returned, with buddies this time. Ryan didn’t exactly fancy that, so he got up—slowly, but surely—and wobbled over to the shore. He found his shoes waiting for him, but again, he had absolutely no idea how they got there. 

He sat on a dry-ish rock and while he waited for his feet to dry, he began to assess how okay he may or may not be. His head was clearer, and as far as he knew, he was hallucination-free. His foot stung a little. He was dehydrated. Mostly okay. 

“HOLY SHIT! RYAN, ARE YOU FUCKING OKAY?” 

Or maybe he wasn’t. Ryan wasn’t sure exactly who said that, but Brendon appeared at his side and Ryan was too busy marvelling at how pretty he was to figure it out. “Hey,” he muttered, reaching for Brendon’s face and missing horribly. 

“Hi,” Brendon smiled, redirecting Ryan’s hand to his cheek. “Are you in pain?”

“No?” Ryan let out a ghostly little laugh. “Should I be?”

“Your foot is fucking bleeding.”

Ryan looked down at his foot. Red drained from the spot on his foot where his little friend had hooked on. He’d never been seriously injured before and didn’t really know what a serious injury looked like, but he assumed it wasn’t that. 

“My friend did that.”

“Was it Dallon? Fuck, I knew he had a thing for feet.”

Spencer smacked Brendon on the back of the head. “It was a leech, dumbass. Ryan will be fine, he just needs a bandaid.” Spencer looked around the area like he was reading environment omens. “We should get going, though. The swimming is no good here.”

“Nothing is good here,” Brendon hissed. 

Spencer rolled his eyes and went to get a bandaid from his first aid kit.

The second he was out of ear shot, Brendon whipped back around to Ryan. “You know, he never denied that Dal’ has a thing for feet. I’m taking that as an affirmative.”

“Did he ask to lick your feet when you two went out?” Ryan teased, feeling more like himself every second. Brendon might not necessarily bring out the best of him, but it wasn’t for nothing that Ryan hung around him all the time. 

“Not on the first date, Ry! But maybe if I went out with him again…”

Ryan laughed out loud and Spencer, re-emerging from the forest with a bandaid, didn’t even want to know. He just gave Ryan the bandaid and rallied the troops. And that was enough. 

~

For better or for worse, no one got murdered on the short trip back. Everything was so normal and in line that Frank didn’t even trip over anything. So very normal that by the time Ryan arrived back at site 10, he was so stone cold sober he needed a drink. 

“I think this is counter-intuitive,” Jon muttered, watching Ryan crack open a beer. 

“I almost _DIED_ , Jon, let me live while I still can.”

“You got bit by a leech!” Jon protested.

Ryan shrugged off the conversation and accusations because judging by the smell, fresh, burning weed was in the vicinity, and it had been at least an hour, right?

Jon rolled his eyes. “You’re not helping.” His eyes said he wasn’t talking to Ryan, so then who—

Ryan heard the exhale before he felt it. His breath came short when the soft curls of smoke brushed against his neck. It was a precursor feeling, so teasing, knowing that just centimeters away from his neck was Brendon’s mouth.

It was a little weird with Jon right there, but that man had been through thick and thin between the two of them and nothing disgusted him anymore. He watched Brendon with mild dismay. “Really?”

“He’s coping with his near-death experience,” Brendon said innocently. He reached around from behind Ryan and placed the joint in his mouth. This was as close to mama bird-ing as he was ever going to get. 

And while Ryan suckled on the filter, the calm of the campground was very suddenly gutted by a shriek. The shriek came closer and closer until it spat out Pete in the driveway. Hands on knees and barely breathing, he held up a finger. When he was able to breathe, he uttered, “Lindsey’s back. She brought friends.”

Brendon took off for site 18 and dragged Ryan along with him, possibly on accident. He was so lost in the heat of the moment that he kept running when Ryan tripped and fell. Of course, he shot a look over his shoulder to make sure Ryan was not mortally injured, but he definitely didn’t stop.

Ryan gave him a thumbs up and watched him run. With much less enthusiasm, Ryan meandered down the road. He took his time, smoking the joint down to the filter by the time he arrived at site 18. And he was glad he did. 

The camp was overflowing. Duffle bags spilled out of the newly-returned van. There was no way in hell all that shit was making it back with everyone else. Some sort of witchcraft would have to go down. The only plus side Ryan could see was that the bear box now had so much beer in it, it should’ve been called the beer box. He mourned his lost brew, overheating back at site 10. He’d never even gotten to the chance to get to know it. 

He decided this was as good a time as any to crack open a cold one with the boys, but instead of cold ones in the box, he found one of the boys. 

Gerard was perched inside the bear box with a bottle in his mouth, and his legs shook like the box was a microwave and he was the popcorn. His eyes poured over the ground dead-ahead of him, unblinking. Either the edible was currently rocking his world, or something else was seriously astray. 

“Are you mouth-fucking the Modelo?” asked Ryan, sitting down next to him.

Gerard didn’t take the beer bottle out of his mouth. “No.”

“Something wrong?” 

Ryan never wanted Gerard to look at him the same way he did when he said, “Bert’s here.”

Worse, was how Ryan replied, “who?”

“Fuuuuuuuck,” Gerard groaned, tossing the beer away out of the box and onto the ground. His head drooped while his hands kneaded his hair into knots. He jittered like he was three seconds from exploding. “Bert. You know Bert. Just graduated, really cool and all that shit, everybody loved him.”

“Bert McCracken? Everybody hated him.”

Gerard clenched his jaw. “I loved him.”

Ryan uttered a silent ‘oh’ and put a hand on Gerard’s back. Ryan remembered Bert—he sold just about anything to the underclassmen. He was basically the messiah to sophomore Ryan. Yeah, he could see why somebody would be into his weird, greasy aesthetic. Gerard was greasy and weird, too. 

“So, your first plan of action was to hide in the bear box?” Ryan asked. 

Gerard turned a groan of agony into a small laugh. “Yeah. I panicked.”

Ryan attempted to drag the glass Modelo bottle back with his foot. “Okay, one question: are you nervous because you hate him or because you don’t?”

Gerard rubbed his eyes until they turned red. “I don’t know,” he sighed. “It was so complicated when we broke up. I was just a stupid freshman who thought someone was gonna sweep me off my feet and carry me into the sunset. I was just over-attached and he didn’t… reciprocate.”

“If everything is so over and done with, why are you hiding in the bear box?” Ryan asked. He didn’t even care, but he knew better than to let Gerard continue to bottle it all up. 

“Because what would I even say? Or do I say nothing and avoid him? And if I do that and he tries to talk to me—”

A shadow passed over the bear box and its contents. “Ryan?” spoke the body casting shadow. 

Suddenly every sitcom Ryan had ever seen became battle strategy, because otherwise he had no idea what to do, now that Bert was standing over them uncomfortably. 

“What are you doing in the bear box?” Bert asked.

Ryan didn’t know how to answer without throwing Gerard under the bus. Either Bert hadn’t noticed Gerard yet or there was some serious ignoring going on and Ryan was not digging those vibes. “I am… high as a mother fucking kite, Bert. Why shouldn’t I be in the bear box? You of all people should understand—”

Bert sighed quietly, stopping Ryan in his tracks. “Hey, Gerard.”

_Well, that went well_ , Ryan thought. The ‘I’m about to be a third-wheel’ feeling started creeping in, so Ryan snuck a peek at Gerard. From the way Gerard described all the everything that went down in the past, Ryan was prepped and ready for this conversation to get real anal, but no.   
Ryan watched him blossom. 

“Hey,” Gerard replied, softer and sweeter than Ryan had ever heard.

Without meaning to, Ryan watched a split second of eye contact branch into a lifetime that never happened. An overabundance of tension hit Ryan like last year’s recently fired school bus driver. Ryan didn’t mind it so much, because it wasn’t painful tension. 

It wasn’t sexual, like “my husband hath been in the war for a fortnight and I am suddenly feeling sinful toward the milk boy” type tension. It wasn’t “hey howdy hey let’s deck this bitch” either. It was like standing on the very edge of a cliff, where the shale starts to crumble into the abyss under your feet, but you can’t step back. Something in you knows there’s somebody’s everything waiting for you, if only you could jump. But you can’t. And the abyss knows that too. 

Ryan suspected Gerard had already jumped before, but the abyss let him slide right on by. Maybe that was the problem. Ryan elbowed Gerard and broke the silence. He knew his words came too slow to sound coherent and he sounded too monotone, but anything was better than the God-awful silence proceeding.

“How was the drive? And how long are you staying?” Was that antagonizing? Ryan’s judgement was too unbothered to unpack that. 

“Good! Yeah, good.” Bert trailed off for a second, then snapped back to attention. “I’m staying until we all go home together, I guess. Looks like everybody is kinda packed in like sardines.”

“There’s too many people as is,” Gerard grumbled, intentionally loud enough for Bert to hear. “We didn’t really need extra space wasters.”

Ryan regretted getting too high to roll his eyes. 

Bert tried a few different sentence starters and then huffed. He didn’t have the words or the extra energy to deal with Gerard right now. Even though it had been years since they dated, and Bert had fucking graduated already, he could only ever recall Gerard as the clingy, lovesick freshman he used to be. He still felt responsible for him. That was Bert’s first mistake. 

“Can I have a beer please? Any kind, I don’t care.” 

Ryan felt bad for Bert; his tone of voice physically hurt Ryan to hear. He watched Gerard slap a bottle into Bert’s hand and shift back into his passive-aggressive demeanor. Bert walked away slowly, like Ryan and Gerard were rabid animals very capable of killing him. 

“What the FUCK was that for?” Ryan asked, grumpy about being involved in this.

“Oh, fuck you. You know I haven’t got a clue what to say to him. What would you do if suddenly you had to hang out with somebody you loved that broke your heart?”

“Um, that’s called my sophomore year, and the answer is cry. A lot.” Ryan shrugged.

Gerard clenched his jaw and fought back all the emotions boiling over within him. “You don’t know what real heartbreak does to a person. I see him, and it’s like any emotion goes. Am I happy to see him? Sure! Sad? Obviously! Angry? Quite possible! Horny? Oh, you fucking betcha. But it’s all his fault so who the fuck cares? Not this guy!” Gerard said. And then he started to cry. 

Ryan tentatively reached out to comfort him, and allowed Gerard lean on him while he cried it out. The hope was that maybe a stout cry would help him think clearly, or at least work the shock out of his system. No such luck. The only outcomes were eyeliner stains and a distinct lack of conversation. 

Ryan tried to be kind. “That could have gone worse, in my opinion.”

Gerard smiled grossly, teary and drenched in watery make up. “No, I’m pretty sure that was rock bottom.” He wiped his eyes with his shirt and tried compose himself. “But thanks.”

Ryan pat Gerard’s back and drank his beer. He was not the man for this. Gerard was his buddy but by no means were they close enough to have had _this_ interaction under any other circumstances. Ryan felt for Gerard, and part of that was knowing that Gerard deserved someone better to help him work through this. 

Across the camp, Lindsey sat on the picnic bench, smoking a stoag. 

Ryan sent love to the stars and promised Gerard he’d be back. Lindsey didn’t look interested in the way he marched across the camp like a Shakespearean messenger boy. He sighed deeply the moment he stopped in front of her. “Listen to me. I am going to be very high very soon. Gerard needs a friend right now, not a human hotbox. I don’t know where the fuck Frank and Mikey are, but you’re his friend too, so please, please go help him. Apparently Bert did quite a number on him, back in the day.”

“Um, I’m Gerard’s best friend, so jot that down,” she replied, clearly offended. 

“Then why did you invite Bert?” Ryan snapped. “I’m probably not the first to bust your ass over this and by God I will not be the last, but did you have to bring him along?”

“Jimmy invited him. Or Jamia. Somebody that is not me, Ryan.” Lindsey stood up and tucked her lit cigarette behind her ear. “Do you really think I’d willing put Gerard in this situation?”

The weed was starting to kick in and Ryan was starting to not breathe. Kinda not good, according to the man himself. “Well, you could have said no!”

“I know. But Bert is friends with a lot people here and he has shockingly little hindsight.” She gestured around to the fire pit, where Bert sat entertaining a group of five or ten people. 

Since when had Bert become cool? Maybe it was the hair cut. The short blonde was a better look, Ryan had to admit. “Whatever. He’s here now. And Gerard is desperately close to killing himself, killing Bert, or fucking Bert, and I’d like to avoid _all_ of those possibilities.”

The two of them watched Gerard inside the bear box, throwing back his head to take shaky sips of Modelo. It was not ideal. 

“Now, that’s just the saddest thing I’ve ever seen,” Ryan said, glaring at Lindsey until her skin caught fire. 

“Fuck,” Lindsey huffed. So, what? She might have had a little too much fun inviting people that would surely wreak havoc across the camp. The only bright side she could see was that her plan was working, but upon reflection… maybe that wasn’t a good thing. Leave it to Ryan to teach her morals. 

She removed the cigarette before it caught her hair on fire and twiddled it between her middle and index fingers. “Okay, here’s the plan. I say we all go the beach and get really drunk and that way we can get all those feels out while nightmarishly drunk. You’ll come-to with a horrible hangover, the insatiable feeling that you did stuff you should not have, and no one will want to bring it up ever again. Problem solved.”

“You make it sound like there’s more than Bert and Gerard at work here,” said Ryan.

Lindsey gave him a look like he wasn’t going to enjoy what she said next. “Well, Frank’s with Mikey, busy trying to not get murdered by Jamia, who is… also here. And then there’s Jenna, who… Yeah, I— I really got nothing for that one. She’s Meagan’s friend, I just thought it would be funny to bring her, now that Tyler and Josh are honeymoon-ing.”

“Wow. Fuck you, Lindsey.”

She nodded and took a drag from the cig. “Yeah, that’s fair. So, what do you say? A brewski by the lake with the worst people on the planet?”

“This is worst fucking idea you’ve ever had.”

Lindsey raised her eyebrows. “You might be right, Ross.”

~

It was kinda funny, Ryan had to admit. Tyler and Josh sat like bad kids in the principal’s office— pin straight and not daring to touch one another. Jenna chatted mindlessly with them, not having a care in the world that they were porking, but shit, the looks on their faces were too good. 

Not to mention how every so often Frank or Jamia would mutter something offhand and the other would turn it into another shouting fest. Ryan previously did not think somebody could argue that fast and angrily while chain smoking, but Jamia demonstrated with skill. Mikey just looked out of place. 

Bob was having the most fun out of anybody. He spent the time wandering around, trying to start fights to the best of his drunken ability. Lindsey’s cruel little joke had certainly amused somebody. 

And since Sarah wasn’t there, Ryan had nothing to worry about. The can of beer he was nursing might have made him a little biased, but yeah, Ryan agreed with himself. This was pretty damn funny. 

Brendon laid on the ground, the grass against his back, his head on Ryan’s lap. He chatted with Andy and Joe, who sat on either side of his human pillow, whilst enjoying the craft brew being passed back and forth. The conversation changed too fast for him to understand what was going on, but he couldn’t have cared less. He’d drop in something about Star Wars or GTA and then make faces at Ryan while Joe and Andy argued both sides of whatever he’d said. 

Ryan wasn’t listening. If he sat perfectly still, the feeling in his lesser extremities would slip away and leave him feeling not all that different from a jellyfish. Everything he saw was sunbaking, but he was in the shade. Like a jellyfish, miles under the ocean. Ryan moved his arms, imagining they were tentacles. And then he laughed because what the fuck was he doing?

Brendon smiled too, looking up at Ryan like he hung the stars in the sky. “Kiss me,” he mumbled. 

“If I can’t suck my own dick then I definitely cannot kiss you, and it saddens me to tell you I cannot suck my own dick,” Ryan replied. He understood that “anything goes” feeling Gerard had mentioned earlier, because whatever occurred to him went directly out of his mouth, no questions asked. As was evident. 

Speaking of Gerard, Ryan looked around for him. 

He was across the beach, sitting silently next to Lindsey in the shade. He was dipping his toes in the water and smoking one of her cigarettes. Next to him, Lindsey sat so rigid and pin straight, it was obvious the guilt was starting to weigh down on her sunburnt shoulders. Sometimes she sent back unnecessary updates to Ryan through eye contact. There was no need. Just by the looks of them, enough was said. 

Ryan’s legs regained feeling as Brendon got up to refill his cup. He made a noise of complaint, but Brendon went anyway, throwing an eye roll and over his shoulder when Ryan moped louder. Whether the intention was to pull Ryan out of his pit of worries or not, he forgot all about Gerard, and Lindsey’s stupid, shitty agenda, and everything else that took energy out of him. 

There was one thing that never sapped his battery, and he was returning from the cooler now. Brendon poured himself back into Ryan’s lap. 

“I think,” he began, pulling out a half-diminished bottle of something clear and smelling of rubbing alcohol. 

“You do? Since when?” Ryan snickered. He counteracted the one-liner by wrapping Brendon in his arms and smiling sweetly. He emoted pure innocence.

“Ha ha, you’re so funny. I don’t pay you to bully me.”

“You pay him?” Joe asked, inching away from the two of them. 

“Kids, one day you’ll understand,” Brendon said. “Now, please, give mommy and daddy some time alone.”

They didn’t need to be told twice. 

“As I was saying,” Brendon continued. “I think we should finish this bottle together and wake up in a couple of hours naked and stupider than we are now.”

“And grossly hungover, not to be a spoil-sport,” Ryan added, being a spoil-sport. Ryan leaned into Brendon’s hand that combed his hair. The touch was innocent but it cursed Ryan too. Every sentence, every smile, every touch kept him hooked on the drug named Brendon. He was a hopeless addict.

“We’ll be together, it won’t be so bad,” Brendon replied. He talked so casually, like he didn’t know how every ounce of his being was priceless to Ryan. Neither did it matter what he said, Ryan’s ears were but sailors and Brendon was the siren. 

The angle of the sun grew lower as the bottle emptied into unsteady mouths. Beams of sun poured onto Brendon’s back, illuminating his frame. The orange glow mixed with his skin, dappling sun-spot galaxies onto his arms. The irises within his eyes crystalised, superimposing the different shades of brown with a red glaze. 

Ryan leaned back into a bed of leaves and grass, Brendon curled around his side. His eyelids reached for one another, nearly touching. The breezes pulled his hair out of his eyes. Everything was so perfect, he couldn’t make up his mind on whether or not he ought to nap.

There were so many other things he could do, made even better by how he was feeling. A swim in the water would make him physically float. But then again, there was a high chance he’d drown. Under other circumstances, that might’ve been fine, a necessary consequence to becoming too omnipotent. But right now, there was too much to lose. 

Brendon’s eyes were closed, but Ryan stared into them anyway. How could someone so small and insignificant to life and death and everything else become the brightest star in Ryan’s universe? Raised religious but unnervingly defiant, Ryan wasn’t sure if he believed in God, but he believed in Heaven. 

Heaven was exactly at the intersection of the two of them. It wasn’t a place, or a time, it was an experience. Everlasting life, and goodness engraved in every heartbeat. 

Heaven was a construct built on clouds and misinterpretations, but for Ryan it was a place in the forests of California to thrive with his only solid proof of love. 

Ryan trailed the back of a hand down Brendon’s cheek, watching his skin react to the touch. Goosebumps rose on his skin and Ryan saw the flocks rise into the air for the winter. He turned his head to watch the sky. Little bursts of darkness flickered like dilapidated film projected on immense blue. Ryan reached out for the birds, but they were beyond his touch. 

“Ryan, stop doing that. You’re acting stupid,” Brendon mumbled, keeping watch with one eye, like light through a keyhole.

“Let’s head south for the winter,” he begged, leaning in. 

Brendon caught him, breath heavy already. Eyes shut and lips locked, they spoke in tongues, creatures under the sun. Nobody outside of the two of them knew that all the angels descended upon them, giving up. They saved themselves without even trying, or so it felt to Brendon. 

“You wanna get out of here?” Brendon asked.

Ryan had a stupid and drunk look on his face, Brendon presumed he wasn’t doing much better on his end. He only caught every couple of seconds, like his brain was buffering. These were likely the last things he would remember later, so he vowed to do his memories some good.

“Yeah,” Ryan replied finally. “You and I have some radio silence to fill in. The best songs are to be played when no one listens.”

Words alone made no sense to Brendon, so Ryan’s bad poetry was entirely alien. He took Ryan’s pulse, and in combination with the look in his eyes, it was decidedly a yes. 

Ryan’s memory recorded one last unearthly kiss before the trees bled together and the sky disappeared completely. 

~

Well, Ryan was definitely right about the hangover. For some reason, he always expected to go to sleep drunk and wake up in the morning sober. Waking up in the evening was worse. There was still day to live through and he had certainly not napped the throbbing headache away. 

“Ryan? Please don’t be dead, RYAN?” boomed a voice beyond the mesh walls. 

It took Ryan long enough to realize he was in his tent, which was a relief. Brendon was still asleep (or passed out) next to him, naked head to toe. Ryan could see the damage he’d done, not-so-everlasting bruises and scrapes across Brendon’s body. 

Flashes came back to him: Light muffled by the (only kinda) white tent. Brendon’s mouth, everywhere. Soft hair between his fingers. A smile that could have been either his or Brendon’s. Maybe it was shared, Ryan didn’t know. And finally, soft music playing through the speaker of his phone. 

The music no longer played. The phone was dead, and the tent was silent. Except for whoever was still shouting outside. 

“Ryan! RyanRyanRyanRyanRyanRyanRyanRya—”

Ryan screamed back at the person. No words, just one long, loud scream of annoyance. The person hidden by the tent let the scream echo throughout the campsite before responding. 

Quietly, he spoke, “uh, good evening, your gayness. You missed dinner.”

Ryan sighed. He couldn’t take much more of Gerard today without snapping. Violently. He sent Gerard his finger, a very special finger. 

“You can’t eat dick for dinner, Ryan.”

“Um, actually Gerard?” Ryan turned to look him in the eyes. “I can!” Almost immediately, Ryan realized this was a mistake. Behind a very disgruntled Gerard, the last shreds of sun hung, immersed in the pine trees. It shone _directly_ into Ryan’s already fragile brain. He smashed his face into his pillow and grit his teeth. 

Gerard crossed his arms miserably. “Please, Ryan? There’s a campfire now and Bert keeps trying to get close to me. You’re the only thing keeping my impulsivity in check.” Gerard sighed wistfully. “You know I’d go to Frank if I could. He’s arguing with Jamia some more, and I cannot get involved in that. She’d rip me to shreds.”

Ryan nodded to himself. Ripping Gerard to shreds was easily within Jamia’s wheelhouse. “Well, what about Mikey? Frank steal him again?” Ryan asked. 

“No, he’s busy stuffing marshmallows in his mouth,” Gerard explained hysterically. 

“Marshmallows?” Brendon asked, not moving any part of him other than his mouth.

“Yeah, marshmallows. Is that enough incentive to get you smoked-out, horny losers out of the ‘Fuck Tent’?”

“That’s fucked up, man,” Brendon muttered. 

Gerard waited for the verdict, solemnly squatting. 

Ryan took the hint from Gerard’s body language. “Okay. Give us a few minutes.”

Once Gerard had given them a wide berth to whine without him knowing, Brendon hissed, “US?”

“Yes, us. I’m not going with him alone. This hangover is not gonna be cured by third wheeling two people who can’t decide if they hate each other. Catch my drift?”

“I keep telling you that having friends is gonna ruin your life, but _no_ , you insist on kindness. Where has kindness ever gotten anyone, Ryan?” Brendon growled. 

“Into your pants, so put out or get out, bitch.”

Brendon rubbed his eyes raw amidst contemplations. “Fine. Where’s the fucking Advil?”

A solid _twenty_ minutes later, Ryan, Brendon, and Gerard sulked their way to site 18. Night was in full effect when they made the final descent. Moon beams cascaded through the trees, basking everyone and everything in ghostly pale light. Shadows bedazzled the ground like ink-blotch tests. 

“I don’t know what I expected, but the bare minimum was food,” Brendon groaned. “So where the fuck is it, Spencer?”

Spencer looked shocked that the three of them stood before him, like he never expected to see them alive again. “Uh… we ate it all? We got some fruit, though.”

“Wrong answer!” Brendon shouted, bolting after Spencer into the woods. 

In Brendon’s absence, Gerard lead Ryan to the campfire. He sandwiched himself in a chair between Ryan and Frank (who was indeed arguing with Jamia). Gerard wanted to reach for both people next to him, but for seperate reasons, he kept his hands and emotions to himself. Crossing his arms did not do enough to fabricate the support he needed at that moment. 

Bert was too big of an issue to deal with on a lonely night in the middle of the forest. 

Crying to Ryan wouldn’t help, though. It wouldn’t help either of them. Gerard could tell Ryan wasn’t having it. Gerard didn’t particularly want to be dragged face-first into somebody else’s problems, and he bet Ryan didn’t either. Just taking a look at Ryan could tell anybody that. 

Ryan was next door to Gerard, but nobody was home. The aura of his surroundings put him on autopilot mode, simply waiting for Brendon to come back and entertain him. Ryan had a hunch he’d eaten nothing but beer and weed since breakfast, and his (approximately) seven brain cells were on backup power. Ryan no longer considered these rare sober moments to secretly be the best parts of the trip. Because this was awful.

“Thank you so much for chaperoning me here, even though you don’t really gain anything from it,” Gerard said. 

The light of the fire danced in Ryan’s eyes.

Gerard put effort into not sounding melancholy. “I know I dragged you here but I think I can handle it now, if you wanna dip. No hard feelings.”

Ryan drowned out his relief with a sober smile. He handed Gerard the joint behind his ear as a crutch for the evening, and disappeared into the darkness beyond the campfire. He found Brendon a couple meters past the road, pissing on a tree like a wild animal.

“Great. Mother Nature is officially dead now,” Ryan sighed. 

“ _Please_ ,” Brendon rolled his eyes, not that Ryan saw it in the dim light. “Mother Nature will be dead in fifty years anyway. Not that I want that to happen, that’s not what I meant.”

Ryan laughed. “I was about to remind you that we’ll still be here in fifty years too, Brendon.”

Brendon put his dick away and walked down the path, Ryan by his side. “Dunno about that. I almost did coke the other day. At my fucking house, with my Mormon-ass parents downstairs.”

“Oh, yeah?” Ryan asked. He pulled another joint from behind his other ear and rifled through his back pocket for a lighter. 

“Yeah. Turns out Jon has been doing coke on a semi-regular basis for a little while now.” Brendon shrugged. Knowing that gave him a lot of feelings, but he hadn’t figured out which yet. Without himself first having an opinion, he didn’t try to ascertain Ryan’s reaction in the dark. “Here.” 

Ryan caught the lighter and paused in his tracks to light up. After a few puffs of smoke rose into the night sky, he passed it on. “Wow. And that bastard had the audacity to tell me that I was being ‘counterintuitive’ today. What a hypocrite!”

The glow from the joint lit up Brendon’s childish smile. 

The two of them walked along. 

“So why didn’t you do it?” Ryan asked. “Besides the obvious.”

“Ain’t nothing but the obvious, baby. Can you imagine the looks on Grace and Boyd Urie if I can tumbling down the stairs at four in the afternoon on a Monday with coke smeared across my face?”

“Sounds like a Monday to me.”

Laughter echoed past the tree tops and farther. They turned off the main road and down toward the lake, where the trees grew fewer and fewer. The dark spires no longer inhibited the view, spanning from an ant on the ground to the red of Mars. 

The dock floated solemnly in the water, like a toothpick in a vat of liquid mercury. Mirrored on the mercury, the light behind the sieve of the sky shone. Stars polka-dotted the surface of the lake, and when Ryan looked over the edge and into the black depth, he instead saw himself, too. 

The trees were a semi-circle behind them, like Mother Nature’s arms, reaching to hug them. Duck casually walked on the gravel behind them. Crickets and other wildling bugs sang to the moon, and Ryan thanked God that it was _only_ bugs howling at the moon. His canine encounter yesterday had practically ended his suffering on the spot.

A cold breeze hissed through the marshy grasses behind the dock. Its soft touch inched Ryan farther down the dock, toward the couple of rocks guarding the water’s edge. He hopped onto one and let his legs hang down the other side. He didn’t have any sixth sense that he’d thus far noticed, but he felt Brendon’s presence next to him without seeing his figure. 

“Did you settle things with Gerard?”

“Uh, well, no, not really. He looked seasick, but it’s definitely something he’s gotta work on out his own,” Ryan said. 

“That’s a threesome I do not want to be part of.”

“Since when do you turn down a threesome?” Ryan snickered, swinging his legs above the water. He wanted Brendon to bring it home with a sappy ending to the evening, but Ryan had to try harder than that.

“Since Gerard started acting like a bottom and Bert got hot. Did you see his haircut?” Brendon laughed. 

Ryan tossed a stone into the water; the ripple disrupted the moon’s reflection. “The blond or the buzzed sides?”

“Both,” Brendon moaned. “He could treat me right. I think he’s got an 8-pack.”

“Oh, bullshit!” Ryan elbowed Brendon. “I repeat myself, if he’s so hot, go hop in that alleged threesome.”

Brendon hovered behind Ryan and wrapped his arms around his shoulders. He pressed a kiss onto Ryan’s neck before replying. “No way. I would never give you up for anything.”

“Not even new and improved McCracken?” Ryan snickered, leaning back into the embrace.

“Not in a million years.”

“Brendon, I’m telling you, the Earth is not gonna last that long,” Ryan murmured, satisfied with his sappy ending. All of his words had become mumbles and his eyelids sank lower with every blink. 

Brendon sat next to him and leaned his head on Ryan’s shoulder. The two of them looked out over the water, the lures at the end of the string. The bowl the lake sat in was the fish’s mouth about to gobble them up, but for now it was just them and all of the stars.

“Maybe not,” Brendon sighed. He was sleepy too. “But a life with you in it is a life well-spent, no matter how short it may be cut.”

“Cool, I’m gonna go cry now,” Ryan said. “And just so you know, that’s so irritatingly sweet that I want to call Spencer out here and make him dump you in the lake.”

“Do it yourself, pussy.”

“I would, but I have to share a tent with you and your wetness,” Ryan laughed.

“You haven’t even seen my wetness yet!”

“I’m pretty sure I saw your wetness this afternoon, but okay.” Ryan shot Brendon a lot that was received with equal exasperation. 

Brendon eventually softened and laid another kiss on Ryan’s neck. “Yeah, well, speaking of tents and beds, how about we turn in? It’s been about four hours since I fell asleep in your arms and that’s four hours too long.”

Ryan couldn’t agree more. “Yeah, this lake doesn’t deserve us.” He took Brendon’s hand as the cool air swept them back down the dock. Even with the looming threat of beasties in the night, or whatever the fuck “the crunch” that tyler had been talking about was, the trip wasn’t so bad. Not when Ryan’s anchor to reality held onto him so tight.


End file.
